If you didn’t see my recent story, Border Patrol agent Miguel Torres-Vasquez was officially cleared of any wrongdoing this week for killing an illegal immigrant east of Douglas on Jan. 4, 2010. The Cochise County Sheriff's Office said the victim, Jorge Alfredo Solís Palma, 28, of Veracruz, Mexico, was throwing rocks at agents as he tried to elude arrest.
It’s not the first time agents have said rock-throwing triggered shots fired.
The defense attorneys for Border Patrol agent Nicholas Corbett — who was tried twice in federal court on second-degree-murder, manslaughter and negligent-homicide charges in the Jan. 12, 2007 death of Francisco Javier Dominguez Rivera, 22, of Puebla, Mexico — contended during both trials that he shot in self-defense after Dominguez tried to smash his head with a rock.
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During the retrial, lead defense attorney Sean Chapman told the jury that Corbett acted in self-defense, shooting an "assailant trying to smash his head in" with a rock.
Both trials ended in hung juries.
In a quick search through our archives and the internet this afternoon, I found links to several other fatal shootings that were initiated by rockings, according to law enforcement.
* Agent kills man armed with rock (March 28, 2007, LA Times)
Youtube video of the above shooting: Man killed by a Border Patrol Agent Mexico/USA border
* Agent cleared in 2005 border shooting (Feb. 16, 2008, LA Times)
* U.S. Border Patrol Agent Shoots, Kills Suspected Human Smuggler (Aug. 10, 2007, Associated Press)
In the boxes at the left, there are two stories from Arizona Daily Star archives about Border Patrol fatal shootings started by rockings.
On Tuesday, I spoke about the rocking issue with Keith Bocharski, vice president the local chapter of the National Border Patrol Council, the border agents' union.
He explained how rock-throwing can be deadly.
“We are talking about rocks that are size of a baseball or bigger,” said Bocharski, vice president of Local 2544. “That can kill somebody.”
He said agents are trained to shoot at center mass to stop threats, he said.
“With adrenaline and everything else, you have to shoot at the bigger target,” he said. “Arms and legs constantly move and it’s real tough to hit a moving target.”
For what it’s worth, he also said the union had been confident that agent Torres-Vasquez would be cleared of any wrongdoing in the Jan. 4, 2010 shooting. .
“We knew from the beginning that the agent was justified in the actions he took on the day,” Bocharski said. “He had a split second to react to what the individual did and he took the proper actions to protect himself and his fellow agents.”
Mexican officials, however, have publicly and privately questioned the whether it's necessary to shoot to kill illegal immigrants who are unarmed.
In the 2007 LA Times story I linked to above, Arnaud Carreno, Mexico's consul in Calexico, was quoted as saying: "It seems unjust to shoot someone who is unarmed."
