Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Holder on 'fast and furious' – 'Never again...”


By PETE YOST, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Eric Holder says an investigation of arms traffickers called Operation Fast and Furious was flawed in concept as well as in execution, never should have happened and "it must never happen again."

Facing tough questioning by Senate Republicans, the attorney general said in remarks prepared for a hearing Tuesday that he wants to know why and how firearms that should have been under surveillance could wind up in the hands of Mexican drug cartels.

"Unfortunately, we will feel its effects for years to come as guns that were lost during this operation continue to show up at crime scenes both here and in Mexico," the attorney general said.

Several federal agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives have testified that they were ordered by superiors to let suspected straw buyers walk away from Phoenix-area gun shops with AK-47s and other weapons believed headed for Mexican drug cartels, rather than arrest the byers and seize the guns there...

Mr. DeGuerin was the attorney of record for David Koresh and the members of the Mount Carmel mission of the Branch Davidian Church near Waco during a protracted seige following an ill-fated BATFE raid on that property that ended in the fiery deaths of all inhabitants. The federal agents were purportedly searching for fully automatic weapons - weapons which were apparently never recovered in the search - in the original February 1993 raid which claimed the lives of 4 agents and several occupants of Mt. Carmel.

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