Free Republic

Over the July Fourth weekend, there was a major development in the Fast and Furious investigation when BATF head Ken Melman made a surprise July 4th appearance before Darrel Issa and Chuck Grassley's congressional committee put together to investigate Fast and Furious. That operation involved BATF(Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms) agents allowing straw purchasers to buy over two thousand automatic weapons and then smuggle them illegally across the border to Mexican Drug cartels. The operation led to a spike in violence in Mexico, the killing in Arizona of a U.S. Border Patrol agent last December and a possible attempted...

Sunday, September 8, 2002 Danger funnels northward Camino del Diablo, in southwestern Arizona, is so heavily traveled by agents and smugglers that its surface is called "moon dust." Stand by your lands: Vergial Harp, of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, has a semiautomatic rifle at the ready while traveling in the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge southeast of Yuma. The Border Patrol's Alex Chavez drives a dozen border crossers to the Lukeville port of entry, where they will be photographed, fingerprinted and sent packing to Mexico. Flow of drugs, people places lives at riskStory by Mitch Tobin Photos By...