Fast & Furious Report Coming

[Kathianne]

Doesn't sound 'complete':

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-five-atf-officials-ruled-responsible-for-fast-and-furious-20120730,0,4364586.story


Exclusive: Five ATF officials found responsible for Fast and Furious
...
According to a copy of the report obtained Monday by The Times, the investigators said their findings are “the best information available as of now” about the flawed gun operation that last month led to Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. being found in contempt of Congress for failing to turn over subpoenaed documents.


Two more final reports, they said, will deal with “the devastating failure of supervision and leadership” at the Department of Justice and an “unprecedented obstruction of the [congressional] investigation by the highest levels of the Justice Department (http://www.latimes.com/topic/crime-law-justice/u.s.-department-of-justice-ORGOV0000160.topic), including the attorney general himself.”


The first report did allege some Justice Department involvement, however, notably that Kenneth E. Melson, then acting ATF director, was made into a “scapegoat” for Fast and Furious after he told congressional Republicans (http://www.latimes.com/topic/politics/parties-movements/republican-party-ORGOV0000004.topic) his Justice Department supervisors “were doing more damage control than anything” else once Fast and Furious became public.


“My view is that the whole matter of the department’s response in this case was a disaster,” Melson told the investigators...

[Kathianne]

Sometimes the coincidences become too strange. No sooner had I posted the above when I run across this:

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/312666/dea-gone-wild-kevin-d-williamson


DEA Gone Wild (http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/312666/dea-gone-wild-kevin-d-williamson)
By Kevin D. Williamson (http://www.nationalreview.com/author/14040)




This Houston Chronicle story (http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Owner-wants-DEA-to-pay-for-truck-damage-from-sting-3743683.php) is terrifying:
The phone rang before sunrise. It woke Craig Patty, owner of a tiny North Texas trucking company, to vexing news about Truck 793 — a big red semi supposedly getting repairs in Houston.


“Your driver was shot in your truck,” said the caller, a business colleague. “Your truck was loaded with marijuana. He was shot eight times while sitting in the cab. Do you know anything about your driver hauling marijuana?”


“What did you say?” Patty recalled asking. “Could you please repeat that?”
The truck, it turned out, had been everywhere but in the repair shop.


Commandeered by one of his drivers, who was secretly working with federal agents, the truck had been hauling marijuana from the border as part of an undercover operation. And without Patty’s knowledge, the Drug Enforcement Administration was paying his driver, Lawrence Chapa, to use the truck to bust traffickers.



This jackass DEA adventure has driven Mr. Patty to the edge of bankruptcy, and possibly toward an even worse fate:


But eight months later, Patty still can’t get recompense from the U.S. government’s decision to use his truck and employee without his permission.


His company, which hauls sand as part of hydraulic fracturing operations for oil and gas companies, was pushed to the brink of failure after the attack because the truck was knocked out of commission, he said.


Patty had only one other truck in operation.


In documents shared with the Houston Chronicle, he is demanding that the DEA pay $133,532 in repairs and lost wages over the bullet-sprayed truck, and $1.3 million more for the damage to himself and his family, who fear retaliation by a drug cartel over the bungled narcotics sting.



In short, the DEA here commandeered private property from a law-abiding businessman and ineptly deployed it in an operation that got a man killed and now endangers a family that had nothing to do with the case. There is a term for what the DEA did with that truck: grand theft auto.


The DEA is running neck-and-neck with the ATF for the title of most dangerous federal law-enforcement agency; in my view, both should be dissolved and their responsibilities handed over to some more responsible party, such as a group of drunken rodeo clowns or ADD-addled teen-agers.


Whoever approved this operation belongs in a jail cell next to whoever approved Fast and Furious.

[taft2012]

I would imagine that the scenario behind that truck driver thing is that the DEA had caught the driver doing something like hauling marijuana, offered him a deal and flipped him to get the bigger fish.

It's an interesting story but I get the sense there are a lot of details missing.

Was the driver caught hauling marijuana and flipped?
Was he caught hauling marijuana in this particular truck?
Did the government confiscate this truck under forfeiture laws?
If so, the fight to get one's property back that was seized under forfeiture does take quite a long time.

[Kathianne]

I would imagine that the scenario behind that truck driver thing is that the DEA had caught the driver doing something like hauling marijuana, offered him a deal and flipped him to get the bigger fish.

It's an interesting story but I get the sense there are a lot of details missing.

Was the driver caught hauling marijuana and flipped?
Was he caught hauling marijuana in this particular truck?
Did the government confiscate this truck under forfeiture laws?
If so, the fight to get one's property back that was seized under forfeiture does take quite a long time.

I just read the Houston article, seems the guy was a 'new' employee. DEA won't confirm or deny he was 'with them' but of the record, yeah, he was. Pretty off the wall:

http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Owner-wants-DEA-to-pay-for-truck-damage-from-sting-3743683.php

[revelarts]

I would imagine that the scenario behind that truck driver thing is that the DEA had caught the driver doing something like hauling marijuana, offered him a deal and flipped him to get the bigger fish.

It's an interesting story but I get the sense there are a lot of details missing.

Was the driver caught hauling marijuana and flipped?
Was he caught hauling marijuana in this particular truck?
Did the government confiscate this truck under forfeiture laws?
If so, the fight to get one's property back that was seized under forfeiture does take quite a long time.

From what i've read the DEA is better than the ATF in general. And you may be right they may have tried to flip him... Maybe. But he was only on the job less than a month. They may have planted him there too or just recruited him with the promised of cash and protection for his troubles.

Either way they had no authority/right to commandeer the company's truck and employee without the companies knowledge.