Judge Allows FBI Shooting Suit To Proceed

WBAL, Baltimore, MD ^ | May 12, 2005 | AP

[CrawDaddyCA]

BALTIMORE -- A federal judge on Thursday rejected an FBI agent's request to dismiss a $10 million lawsuit filed by a man the agent shot in the face after mistaking him for a bank robber, saying the shooting created a potential "death trap" that made him wonder about FBI training techniques.

[CrawDaddyCA]

I remember this one. I only wish the agent would face criminal charges (but that ain't gonna happen), because if an ordinary citizen had acted the same, he'd be going to jail for a long, long time.

[dennisw]

Taxpayers are on the hook for this one. Not the moron FBI agent.

[Squantos]

BANG LIST PING..........

[HiTech RedNeck]

The gummint might settle just before the trial in order to avoid having a precedent set through the otherwise inevitable appeals.

[HiTech RedNeck]

And if the agent loses the judgment so what. He won't be fired.

[CrawDaddyCA]

I wonder if the incompetent agent could be sued as an individual?

[konaice]

And if the agent loses the judgment so what. He won't be fired.

If past practices are followed, he will be promoted.

[dennisw]

Idiot FBI agent won't be fired. He'll be moved laterally to another division. He won't pay dime one. Taxpayers will

[drlevy88]

Judge don't sound too happy about this.

[Robert_Paulson2]

He will do it again.

[dennisw]

Just the way it is.

[Ajnin]

I wonder if the incompetent agent could be sued as an individual?

Yes, however if the FBI investigation ruled that he was not at fault, the Agency will still cover him. I'm sure the Feebs also have PORAC to help with lawsuits.

[An American Patriot]

"Susan Amiot, an attorney representing Braga, emphasized that the agent only had a "split second" to make a difficult decision.

"She also said agents believed they were up against a homicidal, suicidal, drug-addicted bank robber.

This is the best line. Leave it up to some weasel, pond-sucking, DOJ, shyster, to come up with this logic: "

She also said there was no evidence Braga was 'being a cowboy,' because he only fired one shot and refrained from shooting the driver, too."

Thank God for small miracles and Braga's "restraint." /sarc.

Bet his lady friend gets a bundle too.

Now, if they will ONLY start applying the same consequences for their actions, to the other two rogue, near-criminal, above the law LEA's (the DEA and ATF) we might all breath a llittle easier and regain some of our rights--which they routinely ignore, at will,--absent ANY repercussions, whatsoever or consequences for their conduct--and have little or no oversight.

The FBI, for the most part, is not bad and fairly professional; the DEA and ATF, are a menace to society and a danger to us all. (IMHO).

And no, I'm NOT a druggie and don't trade, buy or sell weapons.

It's just I've read--and know about--enough horor stories perpetrated on innocent people by these two groups to make me very skeptical of their usefulness as LEA's, as opposed, to their detriment to society.

Moreover, I am convinced (and no, have not seen any black helo's flying around) that "they" have an "agenda" to take away "our" right to bear arms and are more interested in "filling their coffers"--through asset forfeiture of non-criminals--than in actually, making a serious effort to target the "kingpins," (or money laundering institutions, which include many of our banks) and put them out of business, and "away!"

[R. Scott]

Like Lon Horiuchi?

[eno_]

It would seem obvious that ANY LEO at the losing end of a multimillion dollar suit acted way outside of policy and therefore can be hold individually liable.

In fact, it is the DUTY of our government to recover OUR money from inompetent government employees.

Then chain him to a post and let the family of his victim have at him with a baseball bat.

[Grut]

"We live in a country where we're responsible for our actions whether we're government agents or not," [the judge] said

I suspect the judge of being a space alien if he can say that with a straight face.

[pageonetoo]

The Sierra 4 sniper position was some 200 yards from white separatist Randy Weaver's cabin, deep in the northern Idaho mountains. The man in camouflage nestled in the thick brush there had a clear field of fire on the wooden structure across the furrowed ridges. On Aug. 22, 1992, the morning was cool, cloudy and rainy.

Eight months later outside Waco, Texas, on April 19, the noonday sun was warm with heavy winds out of the north. The Sierra 1 sniper position was in a boxy concrete outbuilding less than 100 yards from the Branch Davidian compound. The agent stationed there could see the front door and several windows of his target over the gentle grassy rise. Whether shots were fired from this site is one of the hottest controversies in the continuing Waco saga, now the focus of a civil lawsuit and a high-profile congressional investigation.

The man in the Sierra 1 sniper post at Waco and the Sierra 4 post at Ruby Ridge was FBI marksman Lon Tomohisa Horiuchi. Over the past seven years, he has become the most controversial law enforcement officer in America. For most of that time, the 45-year-old West Point graduate and former infantry officer has been in courtrooms or preparing his defense. At Ruby Ridge, Horiuchi shot and killed Weaver's wife, Vicki, 43, as she held their 10-month-old daughter behind the door of their cabin. He also shot and wounded Weaver, 44, and his friend, Kevin Harris. At Waco, some 80 members of the Branch Davidian religious sect perished after the FBI and other law enforcement agencies moved to end the 51-day siege.

...........

I'm not a right-wing extremist whacko -- if anything I'm a tree-hugging leftist vegetarian flower-sniffing pacifict. And yet after reviewing the claimed happenstance in this official report, I find things that just don't ring true. The claim that Weaver was drawing down on the helicopter, for instance, is an obvious false one when testimony showed that the helicopter didn't arive at Ruby Ridge until long after his wife was killed. It's an important piece of time-line because the officer who murdered his wife excused his fireing his weapon by claiming he was aiming at Weaver because Weaver was going to shoot at another officer. Since there were no other officers in the air at the time, the excuse LIE simply doesn't work.

[ikka]

Bivens claim would be good. Under a Bivens claim, the officer would be stripped of his immunity and any awarded money would come out of his personal funds.

[pageonetoo]

How about the cops who "chased" a guy at 35 mph around the block a couple of times. shot him 4 times (he was unarmed) and one of their own in a 120 round "shootout" in a quiet neighborhood.

120 rounds, 4 hits (on the perp), and 1 case of 'friendly'fire'.

How many mulligans do they get?

Armed Police Invade High School, No Drugs Found