Posted on 03/03/2011 3:53:01 PM PST by TLI
(CBS News) WASHINGTON - John Dodson, an ATF federal agent, says what he was asked to do was beyond belief.
"You were intentionally letting guns go to Mexico," Attkisson asked.
"Yes ma'am," Dodson replied. "The agency was."
An Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms senior agent assigned to the Phoenix office in 2010, Dodson's job is to stop gun trafficking across the border. Instead, he says he was ordered to sit by and watch it happen.
Investigators call the tactic letting guns "walk." In this case, into the hands of criminals who would use them in Mexico and the U.S.
(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...
As long as Obama is in it will be swept under the rug. Media plan A.
Media Plan B: This was all Bush’s plan.
The article at the link is actually a pretty good narrative of the broadcast.
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sfl
You know, if most ethical people were put in that position they’d call some sort of ethics hotline or something.
I’ve seen this situation called Project Gunrunner and Project Gunwalker. Which is correct?
Apparently there was a shred of morality left in some of them, although I can not feature anyone wanting a job with ATF in it's past and current state.
Anyway this was part of the broadcast interview. Somebody high up in ATF is going to get U-bus therapy for this.
Senior agents including Dodon told us they confronted their supervisors over and over.
"What was their answer," Attkisson asked. "What did they say?"
"If you're going to make an omelet, you've got to break some eggs," Dodson said. (regarding the answer he was given)
I wonder if the un-named tough guy ATF agent that said that would say it again to the faces of BP Agent Brian Terry's family after they were informed Brian was instructed to use the non-lethal beanbags first.
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Ping
Paging rep. Issa...
This is gonna go higher than the ATF....janet nap and that ornery chief of staff to obama are involved in a cover up. This is in the white house.
Well isn't that a coincidence. That's exactly what the drug SWAT thugs say when the shoot people dead in their beds, innocent or not. Trouble is, I can't find any Constitutional justification for making omelets. Nor a legal definition of what exactly an omelet is. But it makes me think ATF supervisors and drug SWAT thugs are cut from the same oppressive and totalitarian cloth, an opinion that maybe puts me at variance with more than a few Freepers.
Makes sense. JN, bammy and maybe Eric would want to push this back down to a scapegoat in ATF. Hence the big showy ATF agent confession on the evening news...
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William D. Newell Special Agent In Charge (SAC)
Jim Needles Assistant Special Agent In Charge (ASAC)
George Gillette Assistant Special Agent In Charge (ASAC)
Nancy F. Cook Director of Industry Operations (DIO)
Thomas G. Mangan Public Information Officer (PIO
That's pretty much the names of the folks the field agents are talking about ~ although there's a suggestion this runs up to headquarters in DC.
I looked over their management structure and these guys don't have the old classic Federal Reserve cities in the mix as Regional Headquarters sites. Insteads there are Divisions and Field Divisions with varying numbers of personnel, and to a degree doing different things (guess crime varies by region).
Names are given for the major divisions but not the field divisions ~ and you can't get the names of the various field agents.
This is pretty typical of any federal police agency ~ and the answer is No, no one wants you to know the guys at the bottom of the totem pole unless you meet one of them.
If you want to know why ATF sometimes seems to engage in willful, arbitrary and capricious conduct in its relations with licensed firearms dealers check out the Borchardt Rifle case.
Notice that ATF uses the sort of document checks found more appropriately in QUALITY AUDITING ~ and that these do not represent any sort of statistically valid result ~ beyond saying "Hey, look, a document error".
This was the same sort of thing the Arizona federal prosecutor was using to bust Campeon and Ramos so famously.
As a practical matter, outside the dream worlds of federal cops, these "errors" constitute correctible or remediable clerical errors of substantially less than criminal conduct.
I'm not sure what's up with these guys, but it looks like someone has imported QC auditing techniques as something useful for police work.
Those techniques ARE NOT useful for prosecuting people.
This sort of nonsense also served to delay investigation into the ANTHRAX attack a good 7 years!
I don't expect improvement in any of this nonsense until we get a Federal Attorney General on duty who has had some serious instruction in the use of statistics to establish probable cause. QC Audits ain't it!
ATF agents I’ve dealt with are usually good people. Dodson is a hero, in my opinion, for speaking out. I hate to say it, but this may show a good that can come of unionized federal workers: They can blow the whistle and not get fired. Dang! Now I have to go take a shower.
Gotta' come from some IGNANT Leftwingtard at the White House.
Caught red handed and now backtracking, trying to save face.
First the story is, “people are smuggling guns into Mexico”.
Now the story is, “Oh, we were MONITORING and TRACKING these guns to catch them.”
Yeah. Right. Sure.
Disband the F’ing AFT. The sovereign states don’t need the help. This is item 5381 to demand when the 2012 Republican Senate majority and presidency joins the GOP House majority.
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