FLE

U.S. Border Patrol Agent Kills Man A Border Patrol agent shot and killed a suspected smuggler at a fence that separates the U.S. and Mexico after the agent felt threatened by the man, authorities said Thursday. Mexico criticized what it described as an "excessive use of force" against immigrants and demanded an investigation. Jose Alejandro Ortiz Castillo, a 23-year-old man who had been caught crossing the border 28 times since 1999, died in Mexico shortly after the Wednesday night shooting, Border Patrol spokesman Doug Mosier said. An unidentified agent spotted Ortiz apparently leading two men and a woman through a hole in the border fence just east of downtown El Paso. Ortiz, who was carrying bolt cutters, picked up a rock as the agent was arresting the woman, Mosier said. The Mexican government demanded in a statement that "all the weight of the law be brought to bear against the person or persons responsible." "The Mexican government expresses a firm protest against the use of lethal weapons in the face of situations that do not represent a proportionate risk," the Foreign Relations Department said. Ortiz had been deported from the U.S. in 2004, Mosier said....
Mexico accused of framing border agent Mexico is withholding key witnesses that could exonerate Border Patrol agent Nicholas Corbett of second-degree murder charges and paying for others to testify against him, asserts a union leader. Brandon Judd, vice president of U.S. Border Patrol Union Local 2544, told WND the Mexican consulate is taking care of all the expenses of three Mexican witnesses to the shooting so they can remain in the U.S. to testify against Corbett. Corbett has been indicted on second-degree murder charges in Cochise County Superior Court in Bisbee, Ariz., in connection with the shooting Jan. 12 of Francisco Javier Dominguez Rivera, a 22-year old illegal immigrant from Mexico who allegedly was threatening to throw a rock at the officer. Judd said the witnesses prepared to testify against Corbett are Dominguez's two brothers and the girlfriend of one of the brothers. "The Mexican consulate is providing all three with food, housing, and clothing – everything these three individuals need, such that they don't even have to work while they are waiting to testify," Judd said. Judd further charged that the Mexican government is intentionally hiding three other witnesses who could absolve Corbett....
How the Fight for Vast New Spying Powers Was Won For three days, Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, had haggled with congressional leaders over amendments to a federal surveillance law, but now he was putting his foot down. "This is the issue," said the plain-spoken retired vice admiral and Vietnam veteran, "that makes my blood pressure rise." McConnell viscerally objected to a Democratic proposal to limit warrantless surveillance of foreigners' communications with Americans to instances in which one party was a terrorism suspect. McConnell wanted no such limits. "All foreign intelligence" targets in touch with Americans on any topic of interest should be fair game for U.S. spying, he said, according to two participants in the Aug. 2 conversation. McConnell won the fight, extracting a key concession despite the misgivings of Democratic negotiators. Shortly after that exchange, the Bush administration leveraged Democratic acquiescence into a broader victory: congressional approval of a Republican bill that would expand surveillance powers far beyond what Democratic leaders had initially been willing to accept. Yet both sides acknowledge that the administration's resurrection of virtually unchecked Cold War-era power to surveil foreign targets without warrants may be only temporary. The law expires in 180 days, and Democrats, smarting from their political defeat, have promised to alter it with new legislation to be prepared next month, when Congress returns from its recess....
White House Gets More Time to Hand Over Wiretapping Info The Senate Judiciary Committee has extended a deadline for the White House to provide information on the scope of its warrantless wiretapping program, a move civil liberties advocates describe as a "step in the right direction" for congressional oversight. The White House, noting that the subpoenas cover a "wide range of materials" over a six-year period, said it needs more time to produce the documents. On June 27, Sen. Patrick Leahy, the Judiciary Committee chairman, subpoenaed documents from the White House pertaining to its Terrorist Surveillance Program, instituted after 9/11 to defend the nation from people intent on harming Americans. In December 2005, the New York Times disclosed that President Bush had authorized the National Security Agency (NSA) to tap the telephone calls and emails of foreign intelligence targets located abroad who communicate with Americans in the United States....