Posted on 01/24/2007 5:51:23 AM PST by NapkinUser
Calls State of the Union speech 'total sellout of the United States of America to Mexico'
Monica Ramos, the wife of one of two U.S. Border Patrol agents imprisoned last week for wounding an escaping drug smuggler, attended the State of the Union speech in person last night – and was sharply critical of President Bush, calling him a hypocrite and worse.
Ramos, wife of Border Patrol agent Ignacio Ramos, attended the event as a guest of Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif.
Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean began prison sentences last week, of 11 and 12 years respectively, for their actions in the shooting and wounding of a Mexican drug smuggler who was granted full immunity to testify against them.
At the conclusion of the speech, Ramos, emotional and in tears, told WND in an exclusive interview, that she considered President Bush's speech compete hypocrisy.
"How could President Bush say that he wanted to secure our borders and that he would double the size of the Border Patrol when my husband is in prison," she asked WND. "Ignacio was trying to secure our border from drug smugglers. And what do we get? I have to show my children their father in prison in chains and I have to explain to them that the president of the United States is a liar."
WND waited nearly an hour after the speech was concluded to be able to speak with a clearly emotionally upset Monica Ramos.
"President Bush can say all he wants that the solution to border security is new infrastructure and technology," Ramos told WND, "but as long as my husband is in jail the American people should know that President Bush doesn't mean a word he says."
"What I sat in the gallery and heard tonight," she said, "was a total sell-out of the United States of America to Mexico. I heard President Bush's message loud and clear. All the president has to offer is electronic gadgets. Meanwhile, our borders are wide open to illegal immigrants, criminals and drug smugglers. God help the honest men and women of the Border Patrol who want to do their duty. It's a losing battle – just ask my husband, he'll tell you the truth."
"The American people only need to ask me," Ramos pleaded to WND. "Tell America that President Bush doesn't mean a word of what he says about border security. My husband is in jail for trying to capture a drug smuggler and President Bush wants electronics? My husband is a hero and President Bush is a traitor as far as I'm concerned. Let him tell my children that he wants new 'infrastructure' or 'comprehensive immigration reform' when their dad who wore the Border Patrol badge for years is shackled and in chains for doing his job."
Rohrabacher agreed with Ramos, emphasizing to WND that "the Bush administration has a hidden agenda with Mexico and that agenda is to keep our border with Mexico wide open, even to drug smugglers."
Asked what message he wanted to send by inviting Ramos' wife to attend the speech in person, Rohrabacher explained: "I wanted to give Mrs. Ramos the opportunity to be in the room and look President Bush right in the face, knowing that this was the man who was destroying her life by his decision to prosecute her husband to the hilt."
Rohrabacher described the injustice he perceived in emotional terms: "By prosecuting these two Border Patrol agents while the drug smuggler is given immunity, President Bush has brutalized the lives of agents Ramos and Compean with a decision that threatens to destroy their families. The wives and the young children of these two Border Patrol agents are now being driven into poverty. The families have no health insurance, they are now losing their homes, and they face a mountain of debt to lawyers. This is a travesty of justice and a personal tragedy that should make President Bush ashamed.
Asked if he had achieved his purpose in inviting Monica Ramos to attend the speech, Rohrabacher told WND:
My purpose after hearing the State of the Union tonight is doubly resolved. President Bush needs to know that we will not rest until Border Patrol [officers] Ramos and Compean are set free.
In history there are cases where heroic people were brutalized and sacrificed by political powers in order to achieve a certain agenda. In this case, I think that's what's happening.
We have an administration that has a hidden agenda with Mexico such that George Bush wants an open border, even though an open border is not in the interests of the American people.
These Border Patrol agents are caught in the middle. They're Americans and they know what their job is supposed to be. They are being persecuted and prosecuted for our sake because they are getting in the way of a power play that has yet been disclosed to the public.
It brutalizes the lives and destroys the families of men who have been willing to sacrifice their lives for us for the last five and 10 years. This is both a tragedy and a travesty.
The continued insistence of the administration to prosecute these Border Patrol agents and to put them in jail and to shackle them and see the families of these men being driven into destitution – this indicates that there has been a decision right at the top that's based on arrogance and cruelty that I think unfortunately reflects our president. It's a side of the president that is now coming out.
We get calls back from the underlings, the assistant congressional liaison officers. This president doesn't return phone calls and he is arrogant and nasty and doesn't treat people very well, not even members of Congress.
The statement we're trying to make is that the president's policy along the border is responsible for murders, drug dealers and terrorists entering the country, millions of illegals. His policy has resulted in the undermining of those law enforcement officers guarding the border, he has totally demoralized the Border Patrol, and in the process of him trying to send a message to the Border Patrol he's destroying the lives of two families. … This person looking right into the face of the president in the same room, this mother of three, her life is being destroyed by President Bush's decision to fully prosecute to the hilt her husband.
American citizens need to rally around these two Border Patrol agents and should call the White House directly to register their protest to this travesty of justice.
President Bush made no reference to the Border Patrol case in a 50-minute speech that focused on domestic issues in the first half and international issues in the second half.
Monica Ramos told WND she was in Washington, D.C., to attend a meeting yesterday afternoon with concerned congressmen.
At least 70 members of the House have signed on to a resolution ordering a congressional pardon that would toss out the convictions and immediately free the former agents.
Monica Ramos described her first meeting with her husband in prison as "heart breaking."
Ramos confirmed the account provided WND by her father, Joe Loya. She acknowledged her husband is being held in solitary confinement in a 6-by-12 foot cell, without windows. Ignacio Ramos is not being allowed any exercise time, and he is shackled every time he leaves his cell.
"This may be for his protection from other inmates," Monica Ramos acknowledged to WND, "but this is abusive. They are treating my husband like the worst hardened criminal imaginable."
She said one of her three young children is so disturbed by the imprisonment that the family has decided to seek counseling for the child.
"My children are planning to visit their father for the first time this Friday," she said, expressing concern. "This will be the first time they see their dad shackled in chains, when they are used to seeing me send him off in his badge and uniform."
The couple's youngest child is 7 years old, the others are aged 9 and 13.
"My youngest child wanted to know if we could order pizza for dad in prison," Monic Ramos said. "No, I told him. Let's wait and have pizza night when daddy gets home."
There is no FRE 324.
It's not available through Pacer. Congressman McCaul has made repeated requests and told it is not available (see link above). And, according to reports yesterday, they have told Ramos' father-in-law, Joe Loya, it is not available.
Loya told WND that he had sat through the entire trial. A complete transcript of the trial is not yet available and Loya told WND that the U.S. attorney's office told him that the trial transcript would cost $3 per page. "At over 3,000 pages, that means we have to come up with $9,000 just to get a copy of the transcript. And besides, it isn't available yet and the prosecutors' office can’t tell us when it will be available." [source]
"What has President Bush lied about?"
"I am doing everything in my power to secure this country".
GWB
I was joking.
How many "other agents" testified? Where was this agent when the activity occurred? Were all agents in similar proximity allowed to testify? Read some more, rudeboy. We've already determined that the prosecution has put out grossly misleading information.
I really hope President Bush will talk with the wives. If he wants to let the justice system sort this out before making any decisions, that is fine. If he is going to refuse, just let thwm know. People need to know where they stand.
Actually it's all the better. In the few minutes of consciousness that he has as he bleeds into oblivion, he could serve has an example to his mates about the hazards of running from the law.
I am finding more than a good share of humor in the fact that someone posting to me on an internet bulletin board thinks they can defend these agents better than their own defense attorneys, with the implication that these defense attorneys are the stooopidest creatures to walk the face of our Planet since the invention of the wheel.
If that were the end of the story, no one I can think of on FR would have a problem. I certainly would not. I will take the word of two HONEST cops over a punk drug dealer any day. However, the operative word here is HONEST. They clearly were not honest. They lied and tried to cover up what happened (whatever it was). All the hysteria about porous borders and agents under pressure and drugs and terrorists and other stuff is just extraneous fecal matter muddying the water. Had the agents been honest from the get-go, the perp would have been in jail for trafficking and the agents would have gotten off with a slap on the wrists.
Let me type this R-E-A-L S-L-0-W for you folks so you can try to follow it: THEY TRIED TO COVER IT UP, SO THEIR RELIABILITY AS WITNESSES IS SUSPECT. Therefore, the testimony of a scumbag drug dealer trumped theirs. Do I think it despicable that he was given amnesty to testify? Sure. But these two cops have no one to blame but themselves.
Do you think the defense (BP Union) has a copy?
Reading comprehension problem? Try again.
Defense counsel has the right to the trial transcripts, as they are needed to file the appeal.
Transcripts have not been made available to Ramos's father in law, who IS the defense. But, who knows... Ramos just hired a new attorney who has already filed an interlocutory appeal. This story ain't over.
Stop posting statements like that. It will disrupt the open-borders people in their efforts to keep these two Hispanic Americans locked up.
That convinces me. Thinking is soooooo overrated.
Show me the transcript. ;-)
We don't know what the facts are. The agents admitted to trying to cover up the scene and failed to disclose critical details on their report. They claim they thought he had a gun. They probably figured nobody would hear from the smuggler again. A jury of their peers (and juries are notoriously sympathetic towards cops) felt they broke the law.
Not only all you have said...but they cleaned up the scene and falsified their reports. Bad decisions all around.
Show me yours first. I have information in hand that the U.S. Attorney found agents to testify that Compean and Ramos said nothing about a gun, and you are simply blowing smoke by speculating that the defense attorneys failed to cross-examine them properly.
No... I don't think anyone has a full final copy.
I've seen no reports to conclude otherwise.
I have seen a lot of reports, quoting testimony. I can only conclude that they are based on accounts of those in attendance at the trial. Those that were reported from March and February carry more weight than those after-the-fact accounts--until the full transcript is available to the parties and the public.
Your version of the "facts" is based entirely on a thieving, lying, drug dealing scum. My version of the "facts" is based on sworn testimony of two officers of the law. Only discredited bots believe the drug dealer. And only enemies of America want the flood of illegals, crime and drugs to continue unabated view this prosecution and resulting harsh sentence as a good thing.
LOL--I just hope there's room in prison for all the people who follow the advice that was posted, and with which you agree.
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