DHS to probe Border Patrol kickback scheme
The inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security plans to investigate allegations that senior Border Patrol managers, including the current head of the organization, looked the other way when a Border Patrol kickback scheme surfaced in Arizona several years ago.
The investigation is the latest development in a case involving whistle-blowers' charges that David Aguilar, the head of the Border Patrol in Washington, and other managers knew of the kickback scheme but did nothing to stop it. Aguilar, who directs the enforcement efforts of 11,000 agents nationwide, has strongly denied the charges.
Robert Bonner, the commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, requested the inspector general's review in a June 3 memo he sent to Richard Skinner, the acting DHS inspector general. Bonner also rejected charges that his agency, which includes the Border Patrol, had failed to conduct a thorough investigation of the kickback scheme. In a phone conversation with Skinner on June 3, Bonner expressed the "utmost confidence" in Aguilar, according to Kristi Clemens, a Bonner aide. The investigation, says Skinner's spokesperson, Tamara Faulkner, will be conducted "as quickly and thoroughly as possible."
The case involves charges by two former Border Patrol agents, Larry Davenport and Willie Forester [Cheating down on the border (6/6/05)]. In February 2001, the two men complained to the Justice Department about a kickback scheme involving agents temporarily assigned to the Douglas, Ariz., station. In a subsequent report, the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General confirmed their allegations. Its report said that some agents had accepted cash kickbacks from supervisors who rented rooms to them, or had taken cash and other inducements from hotels and apartments that sought their business. The agents had been detailed to Douglas as part of a crackdown on illegal immigration.
The whistle-blowers also complained to the Office of Special Counsel, an agency in Washington set up to protect government employees who uncover misconduct. In papers filed with that office, Davenport and Forester said that senior managers, including Aguilar, were aware of the kickback scheme but failed to act. Aguilar was chief patrol agent in the Tucson region, which included the Douglas area, before becoming the Border Patrol's top official last July.
In a scathing report, issued late last month, Special Counsel Scott Bloch accused the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General of dragging its feet, although, ultimately, he said, it had detailed a serious pattern of misconduct. Bloch also took issue with separate internal reviews made by Bonner's agency, Customs and Border Protection. He said that Bonner's agency did not pursue evidence indicating that some managers at the Douglas station were aware of the scheme. By failing to conduct "a thorough review," Bloch said in a separate press statement, Bonner's agency risked creating the appearance of a "whitewash."
In his letter requesting a new investigation by DHS's inspector general, Bonner rejected Bloch's criticisms. He said that, immediately after learning of the kickback allegations, he created a special panel to review the matter. That panel, he said, recommended disciplinary action against 45 Border Patrol agents. His agency, Bonner wrote, "does not shirk from its responsibility to act when findings of fact warrant disciplinary action." (Ultimately, 23 agents and three low-level supervisors were disciplined; two other agents were indicted, and are awaiting trial.) The commissioner went on to say that a subsequent investigation by his Office of Internal Affairs turned up "no misconduct on the part of Border Patrol managers or supervisors beyond that" uncovered in the Justice Department inquiry.
However, because of Bloch's assertions, he added, he was asking the DHS inspector general's office to review prior investigations and "to conduct such additional investigation into the matter as your office deems appropriate." Bonner said that he would make available "all records, tapes, transcripts, or other evidence" obtained by his investigators.
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