Dangerous Rock Attacks on Border Patrol Agents Are Up; Chopper Brought Down by Rock in ‘79

Assaults by illegals, coyotes and narco-smugglers using large chunks of rock on US Border Patrol agents enforcing the US/Mexico border continues to escalate. These attacks can be life-threatening. In some instances, Border Patrol agents have been critically injured when struck in the face or head. Known as "rockings" among the agents, some of these attacks have left agents no choice but to fire their weapons in self-defense. Unfortunately, in some instances, Border Patrol agents acting in self defense have killed their assailants. Critics, meanwhile, insist Border Patrol agents are too quick to use lethal force during rockings, implying that the rocks that are being thrown are small and do not pose a life threatening attack. But evidence shows that rocks that were thrown at agents who fired their weapons in response were of a size that did indeed pose a potentially life threatening assault. And attacks on Border Patrol agents with large life-endangering rocks are on the rise. Perhaps the most dramatic illustration of the threat that “rockings” pose to Border Patrol agents occurred more than two decades ago, in 1979, when two now retired Border Patrol agents narrowly averted being killed when their helicopter was brought down by a single large rock that was thrown at their chopper by an illegal who was among a group of illegals who were trying to cross the border. The two agents in the chopper were helping agents on the ground track the illegals...more