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U.S. gives Mexico millions for security

The U.S. government has sent more than $376 million to Mexico in the past decade for that country's military and police to help stop alien and drug smugglers, guard against terrorists and protect America's southern border, including $50 million due this year. The money, quietly authorized through State and Defense department programs, has been used to train and equip the Mexican military and police, drawing disagreement on whether those institutions are part of the solution for U.S. border security, or are part of the problem. Rep. Rick Renzi, Arizona Republican and a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said the program has had "great success" and helped put narcoterrorists and smugglers "on the defense." "While Mexico does have too much corruption, there are elements within the Mexican government on the front lines of the war against terrorists and smugglers willing to fight and die to bring back honor and integrity," he said. "The United States and Mexico must stay engaged, so we both can be successful in this battle." But T.J. Bonner, a veteran U.S. Border Patrol agent who heads the 10,000-member National Border Patrol Council, described the program as "appalling," saying it amounted to the U.S. government funding attacks on U.S. law-enforcement personnel along the border by rogue Mexican military troops. "This funding program should cease immediately, and the Mexican government needs to be placed on notice that any further incursions by its military or police will not be tolerated," he said, referring to recent incidents on the border in which men in Mexican military uniforms confronted U.S. law-enforcement officers in this country....

Danger escalates for border agents

The bare-bones steel pipe and metal roof structure overlooking the Rio Grande resembles a worn-out bus stop. But to the Border Patrol agents who use it, it's become a monument to the rising tide of violence aimed their way. A few yards away, an agent's windshield was shot out. And on Jan. 13, another agent trying to stop an illegal entry was hit near the left eye by a large rock thrown with stunning accuracy from the Mexican bank. It took 25 stitches to repair the wound. The largest number of assaults last year occurred in the San Diego and Tucson sectors. But agents in Texas have seen significant increases. In the El Paso Sector, which covers 125,000 square miles of border, including New Mexico and the two westernmost counties in Texas, agents reported 43 violent attacks in 2005, an increase of 105 percent from 2004. And in the Rio Grande Sector, agents have reported 41 assaults just in January 2006 – 16 more than in all of 2004. Assaults range from firearm use to fistfights to vehicular ramming. In 2004, agents were shot at nine times and were rammed nine times by smuggler vehicles. Those numbers jumped to 32 shootings and 29 vehicular assaults in 2005. Rock throwing, however, remains the favorite weapon....

U.S. doesn't want border violence mentioned in trial

Recent incidents of border violence echoed all the way to Washington, D.C., and Mexico City. Now the issue has seeped into at least one court case. The prosecution in the case of two Border Patrol agents who allegedly shot an undocumented immigrant in the buttocks a year ago is seeking to exclude from the jury trial any mention of border violence, in particular the recent standoff in Hudspeth County. The motion, filed by the U.S. Attorney's office last week, asks the judge to instruct the defense not to mention during arguments or witness questioning "the alleged dangerous nature of the border." Court documents show the government is anticipating that the defense will use the current warnings over increased drug activity at the border to excuse the actions of agents Jose Alonso Compean and Ignacio Ramos. The agents shot Osvaldo Aldrete Davila, a drug smuggler, near Fabens as he ran back to Mexico. Stephen Peters, Ramos' attorney, said he wouldn't discuss his defense strategy in details, but said that "A key factor is what he (Ramos) reasonably believed at the time of the shooting. The circumstances on the border as well as the activity the alien was involved in are relevant." U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone is expected to rule on the motion today and the trial is scheduled to begin Friday....

Drug Smuggling Air Marshals?

For a law enforcement agency that works hard to be invisible, the Federal Air Marshals have been generating a lot of attention lately. On Thursday, two of the agency's several thousand highly trained traveling armed guards were taken into custody in Houston. Although the US Attorney's office would not comment beyond acknowledging that the Air Marshals were arrested by agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Homeland Security's Inspector General's office, Government sources tell TIME that the two Air Marshals, are allegedly involved with the possession or transportation of cocaine, and may have been paid several thousand dollars to move the drugs. The marshals, one of whom is a former agent of the Drug Enforcement Administration, will likely appear in court to face criminal charges next week, and will almost certainly be suspended....

Inquiry Into Wiretapping Article Widens

Federal agents have interviewed officials at several of the country's law enforcement and national security agencies in a rapidly expanding criminal investigation into the circumstances surrounding a New York Times article published in December that disclosed the existence of a highly classified domestic eavesdropping program, according to government officials. The investigation, which appears to cover the case from 2004, when the newspaper began reporting the story, is being closely coordinated with criminal prosecutors at the Justice Department, the officials said. People who have been interviewed and others in the government who have been briefed on the interviews said the investigation seemed to lay the groundwork for a grand jury inquiry that could lead to criminal charges. The inquiry is progressing as a debate about the eavesdropping rages in Congress and elsewhere. President Bush has condemned the leak as a "shameful act." Others, like Porter J. Goss, the C.I.A. director, have expressed the hope that reporters will be summoned before a grand jury and asked to reveal the identities of those who provided them classified information. Mr. Goss, speaking at a Senate intelligence committee hearing on Feb. 2, said: "It is my aim and it is my hope that we will witness a grand jury investigation with reporters present being asked to reveal who is leaking this information. I believe the safety of this nation and the people of this country deserve nothing less." The case is viewed as potentially far reaching because it places on a collision course constitutional principles that each side regards as paramount. For the government, the investigation represents an effort to punish those responsible for a serious security breach and enforce legal sanctions against leaks of classified information at a time of heightened terrorist threats. For news organizations, the inquiry threatens the confidentiality of sources and the ability to report on controversial national security issues free of government interference....

Carter allowed surveillance in 1977

Former President Jimmy Carter, who publicly rebuked President Bush's warrantless eavesdropping program this week during the funeral of Coretta Scott King and at a campaign event, used similar surveillance against suspected spies. "Under the Bush administration, there's been a disgraceful and illegal decision -- we're not going to the let the judges or the Congress or anyone else know that we're spying on the American people," Mr. Carter said Monday in Nevada when his son Jack announced his Senate campaign. The next day at Mrs. King's high-profile funeral, Mr. Carter evoked a comparison to the Bush policy when referring to the "secret government wiretapping" of civil rights leader Martin Luther King. But in 1977, Mr. Carter and his attorney general, Griffin B. Bell, authorized warrantless electronic surveillance used in the conviction of two men for spying on behalf of Vietnam. The men, Truong Dinh Hung and Ronald Louis Humphrey, challenged their espionage convictions to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit, which unanimously ruled that the warrantless searches did not violate the men's rights. In its opinion, the court said the executive branch has the "inherent authority" to wiretap enemies such as terror plotters and is excused from obtaining warrants when surveillance is "conducted 'primarily' for foreign intelligence reasons." That description, some Republicans say, perfectly fits the Bush administration's program to monitor calls from terror-linked people to the U.S. The Truong case, however, involved surveillance that began in 1977, before the enactment of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which established a secret court for granting foreign intelligence warrants....

'Cyberstorm' tests computer defenses

In the first test of its kind, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) staged a mock government-led cyberattack, called Cyberstorm, to test the defenses of both government agencies and leading private sector organizations. IDG News Service, the news service of publications PCWorld, MacWorld, and InfoWorld, reports that the test was carried out in early February with the help of 115 organizations in the US, Canada, Britain, Australia, and New Zealand. DHS called the event a "significant milestone." Among the government agencies taking part were the Department of Defense, the Department of Justice, the State Department and the National Security Agency. Some of the private companies that participated in Cyberstorm were Microsoft Corp., VeriSign Inc. and Symantec Corp. GovExec.com, a news and information site for government employees, reports that Mr. Purdy said the goal of the exercise was to develop a national response system and implement it across all industry and government sectors. The Associated Press reports that the attack not only dealt with possible attacks by hackers, but also simulated how to deal with bloggers who were intentionally spreading misinformation about an attack....