"Taking into account that the only plane commandeered by just four hijackers crashed before reaching its target, it is entirely plausible that your actions in doing your job efficiently and competently may well have contributed to saving the Capitol or the White House and all the people who were in those buildings," said commission member Richard Ben-Veniste, a former Watergate prosecutor. "For that, we all owe you a debt of thanks and gratitude."
Said Melendez-Perez: "I was just doing my job."
He got little chance to say much more after the panel broke for lunch. A burly man interjected himself when reporters approached the inspector, identifying himself only as a Homeland Security official. The man hustled Melendez-Perez away, saying that the agent's testimony spoke for itself.
The account of Melendez-Perez was a rare bright spot at the commission's otherwise sobering public hearing. The panel released a statement about how the hijackers were allowed into the country despite missed "opportunities" to intercept them.
Several of the men were known Al Qaeda associates who could have been watch-listed. Others had passports that had been doctored or contained "suspicious indicators of extremism," had overstayed their visas, or presented the wrong kinds of visas but were let in anyway.
© Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
I wonder if that has changed even now?