Posted on 01/17/2008 11:37:31 PM PST by pissant
Two California Republican congressmen yesterday called on President Bush to pardon two former U.S. Border patrol agents sent to prison a year ago this week for shooting a drug-smuggling suspect in the buttocks as he fled back into Mexico.
Rep. Dana Rohrabacher accused Mr. Bush of being "arrogant and heartless" for refusing to pardon or commute the sentences of former agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean, who were ordered last January to serve 11- and 12-year prison sentences, respectively.
He said they had spent the past year in solitary confinement "suffering conditions worse than detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
"It has been a year since Border Agents Ramos and Compean entered prison," Mr. Rohrabacher said. "This marks a year of shame for President Bush, who has been fully aware of the details of this blatant miscarriage of justice and chosen to do absolutely nothing about it.
"The president has shown us his arrogant and heartless side by permitting the wrongful incarceration of Ramos and Compean to continue," he said.
Rep. Duncan Hunter, a Republican presidential candidate who in- troduced a still-pending bill last year to pardon the agents, said Congress and the American people have "repeatedly expressed their outrage that such an injustice has been allowed to occur."
"These agents were convicted solely on the testimony of the drug dealer, who has since been indicted on federal drug charges for running drugs into the United States while serving as a federal witness," Mr. Hunter said. "Most disturbingly, he did so with border crossing cards he obtained for his cooperation."
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Uhhh, you didn’t read the transcripts either, did you. When Compean picked up SOME of the shells he was across the ditch and down the other side of the levee berm...he was out of site of anyone on the other side. Of course there were also shells on the TOP of the levee (where they couldn’t have been by Compeans testimony) and he knew he would be seen so he asked another BP agent to pick them up for him after everyone had left.
That BP agent got fired for doing that.
“AN administrative fine at best.”
This is the basic mantra of your crowd. Of course, R&C Compean MIGHT only be fined, or otherwise disciplined for discharging their weapons and not making a report, but once you SHOOT SOMEBODY it becomes a potential felony issue.
Are you saying if a cop illegally shoots a fleeing suspect in the back they should only be FINED?
CCG, you are such a disengenuous...thingy. Now you are outright lying. Ex Post Facto only applies to to making an action CRIMINAL AFTER it happens. It has nothing to do with redifining a law that was missapplied...as in this case.
It was discussed at length and several FR attorneys over the last year have stated that such and that a law could be passed to free them. You demanded I verify it and I did. Now you claim you refuted while you did no such thing except flapping your gums and making things up.
You’re a lying, manipulative, deceitful person. Nothing you say can be trusted.
“Once a bullet is chambered in a Glock, the gun is ready to fire.”
The Glock does not have a safety lever, the safety is in the rear of the grip, it has to be pushed in while gripping to release the safety.
But here was my central question and your response.
“Could congress pass a law that clarifies 924 in how it applies to LEOs in the line of duty or undeclare it as you have stated in a way that would allow Ramos and Compean to be released from the 10 year mand?”
“Yea, they could. But if Congress does anything, it will probably take the easy route and cut the funding.”
The point we’ve been arguing is whether Congress could simply pass a law “clarifying” 924 in that it would not apply to LEO’s who use their weapons in the normal course of their duties...even if that use was a mistake.
Did I misinterpret your response? FWIW, other lawyers on FR have stated this could be done.
FR attorneys? Who are they if you could be specific, and how exactly do you know these people on the Internet are attorneys? And if you have contacted them and used their services, please provide their contact information here.
Thanks.
No sale.
As to funding, a law to block appropriations was already proposed by Hunter, Poe and others. It got shot down in committee, IIRC. (H.R. 3093 was attached to the Commerce, Justice, and Science Appropriations Act).
Do you know of any way where their convictions could be deemed 'not a crime', applied only to R&C retroactively, and result in their immediate release from prison?
Since the purpose is to get these agents out of prison as quickly as possible, the best and most likely route for Congress is to cut off the funding for their imprisonment. Of course, the really simple route is a stroke of a pen by the President, i.e. a pardon.
John / Billybob
Thanks sweetums. From you, that is a compliment. (black is white, white is black).
Now you are outright lying. Ex Post Facto only applies to to making an action CRIMINAL AFTER it happens. It has nothing to do with redifining a law that was missapplied...as in this case.
BobJ... FR's newly declared super-duper-expert-constitutional attorney? Why not answer the questions then and provide support? It's not like you weren't asked multiple times.
It was discussed at length and several FR attorneys over the last year have stated that such and that a law could be passed to free them. You demanded I verify it and I did. Now you claim you refuted while you did no such thing except flapping your gums and making things up.
You haven't verified anything. In fact, your claims seem to be going up in smoke. Perhaps you could direct us to the posts of those "several FR attorneys," or you could ping them, as I haven't seen a single post from an FR attorney backing your claims. Discussed at length? No! You spamming threads with baseless claims does not qualify as "discussion" (IMHO).
Youre a lying, manipulative, deceitful person. Nothing you say can be trusted.
I believe this qualifies as a personal attack, no?
Yep... that really is the issue. Let's hope the Court of Appeals corrects that obvious misdeed (and that the repercussions include "justice" for Johnny Sutton. Disbarment would be a nice start, but I won't hold my breath)
They make an after market safety for Glocks but, ours has none.
ROFLOL, yeah you do that pal.... pathetic. - FlAttorney
“Could you tell us what volume, page and line number this testimony is within the trial transcript?..... Id like to read it.”
It starts in Volume 2012.pdf on page 159 Lines 5 - 16 Ramos testified he was at station for lunch, several sensor hits in the area (area 76)After that it went into some technical details of how the sensors worked, what Ramos did in response etc.
Thanks... but that doesn’t confirm your statement about the van coming into the country illegally. It is my understanding of the testimony that the van was parked on the US side and the drugs were crossed and loaded into it. OAD crossed and drove it then. I”m not going to dig around to find the testimony now as it not that important as to the real charges/convictions against R/C..
BTW: The news yesterday said that White House e-mails [perhaps hundreds] were missing from around the time of the Valerie Plame ordeal. If it turns out that WH staffers withheld/destroyed these pieces of cyber evidence, I wonder if the President will treat them with the same callousness that he displayed to Ramos and Compean?!
Male bovine feces! Ramos was never made to look bad since his only "direct" encounters with Davila was to shout at him and eventually nail him in the posterior at around 180 feet with a 40 S&W.
BTW. I just got back from another trip which allowed me to remeasure the ditch. I was wrong. The angle is extremely difficult to accurately measure, but the best I could do was calculate that it was around 55 degrees. This was after two visits, one going and one on return.
The "going" trip was nearly fruitless due to high winds. The only measure I could do was to reverify the hypotenuse as 17 feet and got a tenuous measure of 60 degrees for the slope. On return I got a better angle measurement(I trust it more) with a result of a ~55-60 degree angle. This was backed up with a measurement with rocks(yeah, rocks which you belittle). Three sets of 10 rocks( 30 total) gave me, 1.181, 1.18, and 1.195 seconds for time of fall. Subtracting a determined 0.1 second delay factor from the average of the three sets results in a time of 1.085 seconds giving a height of ~18.8 feet above the water. Subtracting the height of the toss above the ground gives around 14 to 15 feet for the depth of the ditch. This measure agrees with the ~55-60 degree angle measured. The long and short is that the ditch is not 20 feet deep. That does not mean that Compean fell head first into the ditch. He still would have gone to the bottom had that happened.
P.S. The BP probably are accustomed to me. The did not come to ask me what I was doing.
And even though the evidence indicated the fleeing Aldrete was shot from a side angel, Sutton kept claiming he was “shot in the back” to smear the Agents before the case went to trial.
Sutton’s abuse of his office is a far greater threat to this country than anything the Agent’s did, even if they did what was alleged.
That is without a doubt. The point where Davila crossed the ditch has only one clear path up the side(assuming that the ditch has not substantially changed in the nearly three years since the event). And that path appears to be steeper due to erosion. As it is, the present slope does not allow one to stand upright without sliding down.
As to walking up the slope with hands raised, that is not in the testimony. The only "hand raising" admitted to by Davila was when he was one or two steps from Compean. Everybody else that reported that particular event described it as fending off the "blow" attempted by Compean. I don't think Davila ever really raised his hands in an attempt to surrender. As he entered and crossed the ditch, his only purpose was to escape by whatever means he could use. All of this happened in seconds. Ramos was behind Davila as Davila crossed the ditch and would have been in no position to positively ascertain whether Davila was unarmed or not. No one had the opportunity to pat Davila down. So when Ramos crossed over the ditch, having lost visual contact with Compean and Davila, it is no wonder he fired at Davila when Davila "reached" back. Ramos heard shots as he crossed the ditch and saw Compean "on the ground" as he crossed the levee road. Shots tend not to have identifiers with them.
“Suttons abuse of his office is a far greater threat to this country than anything the Agents did, even if they did what was alleged.”
Worth repeating.
‘Wow. We actually have some Freepers who are sane about this issue! My goodness.’
(chuckle)
I caught a lot of hell in this particular forum over the summer on this one.
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