INS Inquiry Upholds Border Patrol Officer in Shooting of Mexican Boy

An internal investigation by U.S. immigration authorities has found that a Border Patrol agent did not violate federal guidelines last year when he shot a 12-year-old Mexican boy who was standing on Mexican soil, a few feet from the border.

The much-publicized shooting 12 months ago of Humberto Carrillo Estrada, a Tijuana schoolboy, sparked an outcry of protests by the Mexican government and critics in the United States who said that the act was unjustified.

But the investigation by immigration officials found that the shooting met the Border Patrol’s “strict guidelines” governing when agents may fire their weapons, said Verne Jervis, a spokesman for the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service in Washington. The INS is the parent agency of the Border Patrol.

Jervis said the agency policy allows officers to fire only in self-defense or when defending fellow officers or others. Authorities have maintained that immediately before the shooting Carrillo was barraging the officer with rocks--an assertion denied by the youth.

Critics said they weren’t surprised by the action, which marked the third time law enforcement officials have ruled that the shooting was justified.

“It’s the wolf minding the wolf,” said Herman Baca, chairman of the Committee on Chicano Rights in San Diego.

Jervis said Thursday that the most recent inquiry, concluded in the last few weeks, was conducted by the INS Office of Professional Responsibility, an internal affairs unit. As a result of the investigation, Jervis said, no disciplinary action will be taken against the officer, Edward Cole, a six-year Border Patrol veteran who has since transferred to Buffalo, N.Y.

Carrillo, who was shot in the back with a single .38-caliber bullet on April 18, 1985, has since recovered, although he has regained only limited use of his left arm and still suffers psychological trauma from the incident, according to relatives and the family attorney. The family has filed a civil lawsuit against the U.S. government, seeking $3 million in damages.

After the shooting, U.S. immigration officials in San Diego said the officer’s actions were appropriate in the face of a rock-throwing barrage by Carrillo and others on the Mexican side.

Last May, the San Diego County district attorney’s office declined to prosecute Cole, ruling that the officer’s actions were justified under California law governing use of deadly force.

Jervis, the INS spokesman, said the agency’s guidelines for use of deadly force are “substantively” the same as those under California law.

Still pending are the results of a separate investigation by the California attorney general’s office. The findings of that inquiry are expected shortly, a spokesman said.