Border security1.6%: CBP data show dysfunctional Internal Affairs
The good news is that James F. Tomscheck, the head of internal affairs for U.S. Customs and Border Patrol since 2006, was reassigned last week to another job within his agency. The bad news is that CBP internal affairs supports a decades-old culture mired in cronyism and secrecy. Last month, for example, CBP finally disclose data about internal affairs investigations into allegations of abuse by its own agents. Even so, the numbers are so out of whack that this federal report easily might be confused with the Chinese government’s recent version of the violence at Tiananmen Square in 1989: out of 809 complaints of abuse by CBP agents from January of 2009 to January of 2012, only an astounding thirteen required disciplinary action against CBP agents. The public is supposed to believe, in other words, that under Tomscheck’s leadership, a mere 1.6 percent of the charges against his agents over a three-year period had merit.
The good news is that James F. Tomscheck, the head of internal affairs for U.S. Customs and Border Patrol since 2006, was reassigned last week to another job within his agency (Brian Bennett, “Border Agency ousts head of internal affairs, will investigate unit,” Los Angeles Times, 9 June 2014). The bad news is that CBP internal affairs supports a decades-old culture mired in cronyism and secrecy (Lee Maril, Patrolling Chaos, 241-57). Unfortunately, it’s going to take a lot more than an FBI outsider, Mark A Morgan, the deputy assistant director for inspections at the FBI, to clean up CBP’s office of internal affairs (Julia Preston, “Border Agency Replaces Head of Internal Affairs,” New York Times, 9 June 2014).
Take, for example, Tomscheck. In the last eight years, his office of internal affairs has spent very little time investigating hundreds of allegations of abuse against its agents. In fact, it well could be thousands of allegations against agents because until the new head of CBP, Gil Kerlikowske, recently took office, CBP refused to release data to the public about either the number of allegations lodged against it or the outcomes of its investigations into the allegations.
Only last month did CBP finally disclose data about internal affairs investigations into allegations of abuse by its own agents. Even so, the numbers are so out of whack that this federal report easily might be confused with the Chinese government’s recent version of the violence at Tiananmen Square in 1989: out of 809 complaints of abuse by CBP agents from January of 2009 to January of 2012, only an astounding thirteen required disciplinary action against CBP agents.
The public is supposed to believe, in other words, that under Tomscheck’s leadership, a mere 1.6 percent of the charges against his agents over a three-year period had merit. 1.6 percent? Surely, to anyone who has seriously considered the challenges, risks, and day-to-day pressures faced by our agents patrolling the line, from rock throwers to armed drug smugglers, the 1.6 percent figure is beyond the fringe of credibility in our largest of all federal law enforcement agencies.
