A Mexican national has claimed responsibility for killing Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, ABC News-Univision reported yesterday. Gustavo Cruz-Lozano told Univision News “he murdered Terry during a firefight on Dec. 14, 2010, while the agent was on patrol near the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona.
“Two AK-47 rifles found at the scene were linked to the botched Operation Fast and Furious, in which the U.S. government sought to track firearms sales to violent drug cartels,” the report continues, importantly reminding “But it remains unclear whether those weapons were used to kill Terry.”
The injection of the word “botched” and the assumption that the government was trying to track firearms when it made no effort to do so once they crossed the border are familiar talking points that have been parroted by establishment media throughout what limited “Project Gunwalker” reporting they have done. It allows for “Authorized Journalists” to further proffer conclusions like “Critics called the operation irresponsible for allowing guns to enter into the hands of cartel members.”
Those would be “critics” who base their opinions on mitigating talking points, as opposed to critics who have developed relationships and built trust with whistleblowers. But couching things in that way allows for dismissing suggestions that there was some other factor at work besides screwing up taking down kingpins as a “right-wing conspiracy theory,” despite the fact that those advancing that disparagement have produced no proven sources of their own, and those who have gotten their information from reform-minded insiders have had it consistently validated.
Case in point is this bit of raw intel presented in this column three days into 2011:
Coming next will be more info on what the agents refer to as the Phoenix ATF office "walking across" ARs and AKs to pad their statistics and especially the one that may have killed the BP agent.
Diversionary finger-pointing by those with an administration-supporting agenda aside, that “pad their statistics” allegation came neither from the Republicans nor the NRA, although most wouldn’t know it if relying on what passes for recognized "news." The other thing proponents of the “botched gun sting” line have been wholly unable to articulate is how one gets to kingpins by letting guns bought by underlings escape into the wild with no attempt to track them, something colleague Kurt Hofmann appropriately compares to the “Underpants Gnomes” of the cartoon show “South Park,” whose business plan consists of three phases, with the transformational step between initiating actions and outcome left bafflingly undefined.
The only explanation, and the one borne out by reality, is the guns were only traceable back to their source when found in connection with crimes, or, as “The Department of Justice’s Operation Fast and Furious: Accounts of ATF Agents” joint staff report concluded:
Operation Fast and Furious contributed to the increasing violence and deaths in Mexico. This result was regarded with giddy optimism by ATF supervisors hoping that guns recovered at crime scenes in Mexico would provide the nexus to straw purchasers in Phoenix.
As Hofmann has noted, “Let's be clear--the only thing 'botched' in 'Project Gunwalker' was the cover-up.”
But what remains unclear, as the ABC-Univision report admits, is whether either of the Fast and Furious “walked” guns found at the Terry murder scene were used by his killer, something confirmed by the Office of Inspector General Report, which notes “The FBI tested the two firearms recovered at the scene of the shooting and was unable to determine whether or not either gun was used to shoot Agent Terry.”
That testing procedures and results have not been requested and/or made public by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is something Chairman Darrell Issa ought to rectify, especially since it’s not exactly like the FBI and its parent Department of Justice have proven themselves to be forthright about their respective Fast and Furious roles throughout the investigations, and it would be helpful to allow for independent analysis -- something that could be expertly done in a controlled and recorded manner to preclude chain of custody or evidence alteration complications.
With this latest confession, there’s one more source of forensic evidence that could be used to help corroborate and refine existing observations, and potentially narrow things down even more to the point where a conclusion can be reached: Check the guns for Cruz-Lozano’s fingerprints.
And ask him to help identify which gun he used. He says he’s “willing to pay for all the crimes” he’s committed, not that he ever can. But at least his full cooperation in this and other matters to identify accomplices and higher-ups would be a good faith deposit.
UPDATE: Per The Monitor, Cruz-Lozano claims to be "a former Mexican police officer."
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