Bush commutes sentences of former US border agents

[David]

AP


WASHINGTON – In his final acts of clemency, President George W. Bush on Monday granted early prison releases to two former U.S. Border Patrol agents whose convictions for shooting a Mexican drug dealer fueled the national debate over illegal immigration.

Bush, responding to heavy pressure from Republican and Democratic lawmakers alike, commuted the prison sentences of Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean. The two guards from El Paso, Texas, each were sentenced to more than 10 years for the shooting, which they tried to cover up. They will be released within two months.

Opposition to their convictions, sentencing and firings has simmered ever since the shooting occurred in 2005.

"After four years of fighting this, it's taken a toll on me and my daughter, and really the whole family," said Joe Loya, Ramos' father-in law, who has received tens of thousands of supportive e-mails and spent much of the past two years traveling the country to speak about the case. "We wouldn't give up. ... I knew sooner or later God would come through — that finally it would happen."

He said his daughter, Monica Ramos, called from New York after learning the news that her husband soon would be released from a federal prison just outside Phoenix.

"She could hardly speak," Loya said.

The border agents' case became a rallying cause for conservatives concerned about border protection. On talk shows, people sympathetic with the agents argued that the men were just doing their jobs, defending the U.S.-Mexico border against criminals.

Bob Baskett, Compean's attorney in Dallas, cited widespread congressional support from the bipartisan congressional delegation from Texas. "I think the president did the right thing," he said. "An awful lot of people did an awful lot of work to get this done."

David Botsford, a lawyer for Ramos in Austin, Texas, said he had been guardedly optimistic that the commutations would be granted because of the support from Congress and the thousands of people who had sent letters of concern. The president has shown "he's a compassionate man," Botsford said.

Rep. John Culberson, R-Texas, who called the agents' convictions a "grotesque injustice," said he and other lawmakers initially had hoped to have the agents pardoned. "When it became evident there was resistance at the White House to a pardon, that's when we shifted gears to ask for a commutation," he said.

Culberson helped gather signatures from 31 of the 34 current members of the Texas congressional delegation and two former delegation members for a letter asking Bush for the commutations. Culberson hand-delivered the letter to the White House last week.

"I was beginning to really be concerned that with literally only hours left in the president's term, this might not happen," he said. "With this one decision, President Bush has done more to improve his popularity than any single thing he could do."

Compean and Ramos were convicted of shooting admitted drug smuggler Osvaldo Aldrete Davila in the buttocks as he fled across the Rio Grande, away from an abandoned van load of marijuana. He remains in a low-security prison in Fort Worth, Texas.

The border agents claimed at their trials that they believed the smuggler was armed and that they shot him in self defense. The prosecutor in the case, a U.S. attorney who was appointed by Bush in 2001, said there was no evidence linking the smuggler to the van of marijuana. The prosecutor also said the border agents didn't report the shooting and tampered with evidence by picking up several spent shell casings.

White House officials said Bush didn't pardon the men for their crimes, but commuted their sentences because he believed they were excessive and that they had already suffered the loss of their jobs, freedom and reputations.

Compean, 32, and Ramos, 39, were sentenced to 12 years and 11 years in prison, respectively. They each have served about two years. Under the terms of Bush's commutation, their prison sentences will expire on March 20, but their three-year terms of supervised release and the fines will remain intact.

During his presidency, Bush has granted a total of 189 pardons and 11 commutations. That's fewer than half as many as Presidents Bill Clinton or Ronald Reagan issued during their two-term tenures. Bush technically has until noon on Tuesday when President-elect Barack Obama is sworn into office to exercise his executive pardon authority, but presidential advisers said no more were forthcoming.

In an earlier high-profile official act of forgiveness, Bush saved Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, from serving prison time in the case of the 2003 leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity. Libby was convicted of perjury and obstructing justice. Bush could still grant him a full pardon, although Libby has not applied for one.

Clinton issued a total of 457 pardons or commutations in eight years in office. Bush's father, George H. W. Bush, issued 77 in four years. Reagan issued 406 in eight years, and President Jimmy Carter issued 563 in four years. Since World War II, the largest number of pardons and commutations — 2,031 — came from President Harry Truman, who served 82 days short of eight years.

[namvet]

im glad he did it. they were facing armed criminals.

[Seascamp]

From the get-go, this situation has had a bad aroma about it. What I perceived was an overzealous Assistant Attorney General, a prosecution dog pile, a highly tainted witness, an exceptionally harsh sentence, and exceptionally harsh prison conditions. One of them was nearly beaten to death due to a complete lack of inmate security coupled with warden indifference; without outside support making lots of noise, I doubt either one would have survived.

Gut feel tells me that there was never any justice intended and the trial was just so much theater driving a fixed and pre-determined outcome. Apparently those two Border Patrol Agents peed in some mighty corrupt and powerful border bean pots and became marked men. I really hope they don’t intend to return to their home town of El Paso; they are still marked men and will be hunted down, I figure.
Commutation of sentence is a step in the right direction. A better step would have been just pitch the entire court transcript as being tainted, highly unreliable and the work product of political placation and /or judicial corruption.

Strong message to Border Patrol Agents, watch your back; you have no friends in front of you or behind you, either.


Scamp

[Seascamp]

Addendum to thought; Killing Border Agents and then high-tailing it back to Mexico equals no legal consequences at all. Even if completely identified by US authorities, Mexican Judges just pitch the case on the grounds of ‘no evidence’ and the perps walk.

Net of all that is that double standards equal no standards at all. Open season on Border Patrol Agents and zero consequences if they can get back across the border and get the Mexican Judicial “King’s X”. Conversely, exceptionally bad consequences happen if a US Border Patrol Agent reacts, even in self-defense or what the Border Agent perceives to be a threatening situation and reacts in self-defense. Shooting gallery ducks, eh.

Scamp

[namvet]

I remember thinking if these illegals were part of the MS-13 gang

[Seascamp]

Actually not, MS 13 boils out of central America, El Salvador mostly and operate inland and not on the border. They mess with the Mexican controlled border corruption, they will be shot down like so many mangy dogs. I presume that MS 13 challenges the Mexican gangs for border control, but not likely that they have the fire power or infrastructure to take the Mexican border operations away from the Mexican criminal gangs. I’m sure they would like to do just that and are perhaps part of the current Mexican war and body count.

For reference: 13 = the thirteenth letter of the alphabet, M. M or MM or "emma" means Mexican Mafia. The Prefix designation like Lima 13, Florentine 13, Suranos 13, etc. does not signify fraternal solidarity, but rather, who is to kill whom over what bit of colored cloth and extortion rights-criminal rights in a given area.

MS=Mara Salvatrucha; totally bloody and ruthless out of El Salvador, most noted for their brutal machete attacks; their hall mark.

Scamp

[namvet]

Originally Posted by Seascamp

Actually not, MS 13 boils out of central America, El Salvador mostly and operate inland and not on the border. They mess with the Mexican controlled border corruption, they will be shot down like so many mangy dogs. I presume that MS 13 challenges the Mexican gangs for border control, but not likely that they have the fire power or infrastructure to take the Mexican border operations away from the Mexican criminal gangs. I’m sure they would like to do just that and are perhaps part of the current Mexican war and body count.

For reference: 13 = the thirteenth letter of the alphabet, M. M or MM or "emma" means Mexican Mafia. The Prefix designation like Lima 13, Florentine 13, Suranos 13, etc. does not signify fraternal solidarity, but rather, who is to kill whom over what bit of colored cloth and extortion rights-criminal rights in a given area.

MS=Mara Salvatrucha; totally bloody and ruthless out of El Salvador, most noted for their brutal machete attacks; their hall mark.

Scamp

MS-13 is operating widely and openly in the US. they are killing off rival gangs here. ie LA. as well as American citizens

The MS-13 gang, aka Mara Salvatrucha 13, is one of the most violently dangerous gangs in the United States - and one of the most organized. The MS-13 gang has cliques, or factions, located throughout the United States and is unique in that it retains is ties to its El Salvador counterparts. With cliques in Washington DC, Oregon, Alaska, Arkansas, Texas, Nevada, Utah, Oklahoma, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, Florida, Canada, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, and several other South American countries, the MS-13 gang is truly "international" and on the verge of becoming the first gang to be categorized as an "organized crime" entity.

source

MS-13 gang growing extremely dangerous, FBI says:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/...ng-grows_x.htm

[Seascamp]

Vet,
I'd say terrorists of the first order, and a self-inflected wound. No doubt they will take out the ad-hock Mexican gangs that are popping up like prairie dogs all over the western US. MS 13 has gone beyond the cheep theatrics, tats, colors and macho strutting associated with the usual Mexican gangs, their groupies and connected wannabees.

Big advantage, MS 13 doesn’t do the usual Mexican gang fratricide among their own, nope. A Mexican gang gets in their way and they just go to the instant kill mode and survivors are very rare, indeed. Nothing fancy, no macho prancing n’ dancing, just dead bodies. Muy mala hombres.

Scamp

[darrels joy]

EL PASO, Texas -- KFOX TV was the first to report earlier this morning that former border patrol agents Jose Compean and Ignacio Ramos were released from federal prison.


Ramos, who has spent the last two years in the Phoenix Federal Prison, accompanied his wife and attorney through Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix. Ramos was released from the prison around 8 a.m.


The two agents, who worked out of the El Paso Border Patrol Sector, have been in prison since January 2007. They were found guilty in federal count on numerous charges and each received a minimum of 10 years in prison for shooting an unarmed drug smuggler, then trying to cover it up.


On former President George W. Bush's last day in office, last month, he commuted the sentences for the two former agents. Former agent Jose Compean was released from the federal prison in Ohio around 3 a.m. Tuesday.


Although former agents cannot talk to the media until after their official release from federal custody on March 20, KFOX did get an exclusive interview with Ramos' wife, Monica, while they were at the airport in Phoenix.


You can look for that interview and more details surrounding the release of the former agents throughout the day on KFOXTV. com, tonight at KFOX News at Six and again on KFOX News At Nine.


Tell us what you think about the release of these two former Border Patrol agents below this story.

http://www.kfoxtv.com/news/18733176/detail.html