Senator Grassley Pursues Malfeasance Of ‘Project Gunrunner’

As the ATF whistle-blowers over at Sipsey Street Irregulars have stated:

Welcome to the party, pal!

The B. Hussein administration has, so far, been successful in keeping the information about ‘Project Gunrunner’ and its deadly failure out of the news. Fortunately for us, Sen. Grassley has latched onto this, along with many bloggers.

The reason this failed project has gotten as much as attention as it has is due to the death of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry in Arizona on the night of 14 Dec 10. Two guns were recovered at the scene of the crime that were used by the murderers, both were AK-47 variants purchased at a Glendale, Arizona gun shop, under the auspices and guidance from the BATF and its ‘Project Gunrunner.’

A brief description of this project:

Project Gunrunner-ATF Fact Sheet

Firearm tracing intelligence is critical because it allows ATF and its partners to identify trafficking corridors, patterns and schemes as well as traffickers and their accomplices. Firearms tracing helps identify firearms straw purchasers, the traffickers, trafficking networks and patterns, thus allowing law enforcement to target and dismantle the infrastructure supplying firearms to the DTOs in Mexico.

ATF conducts firearms seminars with federal firearms licensees, commonly referred to as licensed gun dealers, to educate the firearms industry on straw purchasers and gun trafficking. More than 3,700 industry members attended outreach events in SWB divisions in FY 2007.

What the project became was the BATF using FFL’s and straw-buyers to sell guns that would cross into Mexico for the purpose of closing down those illegal gun running routes. It served two political purposes, to prove guns from the U.S. did cross into Mexico, which would then justify additional anti-gun legislation. The BATF lost control of the accountability aspect of this project, it would appear from incompetent leadership, and now the BATF leadership(led by an interim director) is trying the old CYA by refusing to answer questions, calling on the even more corrupt and incompetent DOJ to lead the fight against accountability.

I will list the available correspondence from Sen. Grassley’s office to the BATF acting director, the DOJ’s letter to the Senator and his response to the DOJ. At no time has the BATF responded directly to Sen. Grassley’s letter to them.

Sen. Grassley to BATF-27 Jan 11

Sen. Grassley to BATF-31 Jan 11

DOJ to Sen. Grassley-4 Feb 11(page 1)

(page 2)

Sen. Grassley to DOJ-9 Feb 11

I couldn’t copy and paste relevant sentences or paragraphs from the first four links above, but I can from the last link, Sen. Grassley’s letter in response to the DOJ’s sniveling letter from an assistant attorney general.

From Sen. Grassley to DOJ’s pathetic response:

The dealer who sold the weapons allegedly recovered at the scene of Agent Terry’s death met with both ATF representatives and Assistant U.S. Attorneys as early as December 17, 2009 to “discuss his role as [a Federal Firearms Licensee] FFL during this investigation.” On January 9, 2010, Jaime Avila bought three more firearms at the same Glendale, Arizona gun dealer and his purchase was entered into an ATF database two days later. By January 13, ATF added Avila to a suspect person database for the investigation. On January 14, ATF entered the firearms Avila purchased five days earlier into the National Tracing Center’s Suspect Gun Database.

On January 16, 2010, Avila bought three AK-47 variant, Romanian WASR-10 assault rifles from the same dealer with the serial numbers 1983AH3977, 1979IS1530,and 1971CZ3775.
ATF entered these weapons into the National Tracing Center’s Suspect Gun Database three days later.
Over the next several months, ATF continued to track Avila’s multiple firearms purchases in near real-time, including two purchases of .50 caliber rifles in June 2010.

After the shooting of CBP Agent Terry, law enforcement officials recovered from the scene two assault rifles.
On December 16, 2010, ATF’s trace results confirmed that serial numbers 1983AH3977 and 1971CZ3755 match two of the three rifles purchased by Avila and tracked by the ATF nearly a year earlier. In addition to these specific weapons, the indictment of Avila and others references approximately 769 firearms. Of those, the indictment refers to the recovery of only about 103 weapons. So, where are the other approximately 666 weapons referenced in the indictment? Why did the ATF not seize them?

Also included in Sen. Grassley’s letter to the DOJ is an email he received from Agent Terry’s stepmother:

It’s hard to accept that our son was shot and murdered with a gun that was bought in the U.S. We have not had any contact from the Border Patrol or any other agents since returning home on the 22nd of January. Our calls are not returned. I truly feel that our son’s death is a cover-up and they hope that we will go away. That will not happen. We want to know who allowed the sale of that gun that murdered our son. Any help will be appreciated. We are the victims of this case and we want some answers.

Not only does the Terry family need to know the truth, however difficult it may be to accept, so do the American people. We have a right to know exactly what our law enforcement agencies are doing to keep us safe and secure. We also need to know if or when those agencies have failed or acted illegally, putting us in danger.

The whistle-blowers from the BATF are putting their careers on the line in honor of their fallen friend. They also know all too well that they could be the next agent who falls due to an inept and politically motivated project directed by their feckless leadership. Those agents deserve our thanks, as does Sen. Grassley for pursuing this inquiry.

If you can or will, spread the word about this atrocious situation to others and contact your Senators, encourage them to support Sen. Grassley in his investigation.

We may have two more years of the lawless Eric Holder to contend with, but those two years can certainly be made discomfiting if he continues to thwart the justice that the American people deserve.