Drug smuggler shot by Border Patrol agents indicted.

[peejay 327]

Drug smuggler shot by agents gets indicted

By ALICIA A. CALDWELL

Associated Press

EL PASO — More than two years after being shot and wounded by a pair of U.S. Border Patrol agents later convicted in the shooting, an admitted Mexican drug smuggler faces federal charges, U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton said.

Osvaldo Aldrete Davila, who was shot in the buttocks in February 2005 after fleeing from border agents during an attempted smuggling attempt, has been indicted on charges of smuggling marijuana in September and October of that year.

Aldrete was arrested Thursday at an El Paso border crossing on charges of possession with the intent to distribute a controlled substance, conspiracy to import a controlled substance and conspiracy to possess a controlled substance with intent to distribute.

The agents, Jose Alonso Compean and Ignacio Ramos, were convicted last year of shooting Aldrete and lying about it. Both were sentenced to more than a decade in prison.

Aldrete is scheduled to appear in federal court in El Paso today.

"For more than a year, critics of the prosecution ... have complained that Aldrete, the fleeing, unarmed drug smuggler they shot, should have been prosecuted for drug smuggling," Sutton said in a written statement. "I have repeatedly said that if we obtain sufficient competent and admissible evidence against Aldrete, we would prosecute him."

Aldrete's shooting and the subsequent arrest and conviction of Ramos and Compean caused a national firestorm among conservative lawmakers and others. Critics of Sutton have repeatedly called the prosecution unjustified and the sentences extreme.

In July, conservative Republicans won initial House support for an effort to cut federal funding to house the former agents in prison.

U.S. Rep. John Culberson, R-Texas, said Thursday that Aldrete's arrest and indictment should have come sooner.

"It's about time they arrested the drug dealer," Culberson said in a statement issued by his office in Washington. "It's long past time for them to release agents Ramos and Compean."

Joe Loya, Ramos' father-in-law, said the indictment was not surprising.

"He is a career criminal who has been smuggling drugs since he was 14," Loya said. "Who I really feel sorry for is his wife and children."

Opponents of the prosecution against Ramos and Compean have previously argued that Sutton's office ignored evidence that Aldrete, who acknowledged smuggling drugs the day he was shot in 2005, had smuggled drugs a second time. He was given immunity for the first smuggling attempt to testify against the agents.

According to testimony at the agents' trial, Aldrete was shot after a struggle with Compean as Aldrete tried to make it back across the border. Compean fired more than a dozen shots while Ramos fired a single shot. It was Ramos' bullet that hit Aldrete.

Compean said he believed he saw a gun in Aldrete's hand during their confrontation. Aldrete insisted that he was unarmed.

The agents were accused and convicted of failing to report the shooting and trying to cover it up.

Ramos and Compean began serving their prison sentences in January.

If convicted of the drug charges, Aldrete faces up to 40 years in prison and a $2 million fine.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metrop...an/5307152.html

[Ban Hammer 14,291]

If convicted of the drug charges, Aldrete faces up to 40 years in prison and a $2 million fine.

good

[peejay 327]

There were no details in the story as to why or how this guy was on the US side of the border to be arrested on Thursday. Did this guy still have a free pass to enter the USA legally? What is a known Mexican narcotics smuggler and chronic illegal alien doing in the USA? Was he entering or leaving through the border checkpoint when arrested?

Ramos and Compean should be pardoned by Bush and sent home to their families. They never should have been sent to jail in the first place.

Aldrete is the one that should be in jail.

[Hilarious Clinton 452]

We wouldn't even have this situation if we ended the drug war.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

We wouldn't even have this situation if we ended the drug war.

[yassmine2878 1]

What a lovely place to get shot. In the butt, that is, not the border. The only thing that would have been better would have been the border of his butt.

[pedroh 21]

owned

hey, but, did the border agents were convicted for shooting him in the @rse? or for lying about it? I didn't know that fact before..

[Ban Hammer 14,291]

What a lovely place to get shot. In the butt, that is, not the border. The only thing that would have been better would have been the border of his butt.

he'll get shot in the azz plenty of times now in prison.

[archie07 0]

Very Good

[Scott & Lai 12]

We wouldn't even have this situation if we ended the drug war.