INS Chief Testifies on Temecula Crash

WASHINGTON —  The commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service testified Thursday that a proposed new pursuit policy should eliminate most dangerous high-speed chases but said the blame for a fatal Temecula crash early last month involving Border Patrol agents was “misplaced.”

INS chief Gene McNary, summoned before the government Information, Justice and Agriculture Subcommittee to answer questions about the incident, asked Congress for more agents and equipment to police the San Diego border area and for tougher penalties for alien smugglers.

“Public anger about this violence should be directed toward those who violate the law,” McNary said in calling for prison sentences of up to 20 years for smugglers who put the lives of undocumented workers in danger.

The congressional hearing was prompted by the June 2 collision of a speeding truck filled with 12 undocumented workers with a car near Temecula Valley High School. The truck, which had been briefly pursued by a marked Border Patrol vehicle, ran a stoplight and rammed the car, driven by a banker taking his son and a friend to school.

All three died, along with two other students on a sidewalk. One passenger in the truck later died of injuries from the crash.

The incident set off a new round of criticism of the Border Patrol, whose high-speed pursuits through populated areas have resulted in at least 35 deaths over the past 10 years, according to Rep. Bob Wise (D-West Virginia), chairman of the subcommittee.

Two Border Patrol checkpoints, one near Temecula, the other near San Clemente, form a second line of defense for the undermanned federal agents stationed on the border. But local officials from both areas have long complained that the freeway checkpoints funnel dangerous auto chases onto quiet surface streets.

In response to the outcry, Reps. Al McCandless (R-Riverside) and Ron Packard (R-Oceanside) called for subcommittee hearings, which brought together Temecula officials, area congressmen, a Border Patrol union official and expert witnesses on law enforcement.

Late last week the INS proposed a more restrictive vehicle pursuit policy that limits individual agent discretion, shifts more control to supervisors and requires better communication with local and state law enforcement agencies.

Most important, the proposed policy requires that the “immediate danger” of the chase can be no greater than the “potential danger” to the public if the suspects remain at large.

Using that strict criterion, McNary conceded, most high-speed chases would not be authorized.

Temecula Mayor Pat Birdsall called the new policy a “good first step” but called for more detailed “chase criteria,” including time of day, road conditions and population density.

She also asked the INS to move the Temecula checkpoint farther south to discourage would-be alien smugglers from traveling roads that skirt the checkpoint but lead to residential areas.

Birdsall and McNary disagreed on some of the details of the Temecula crash. An internal INS audit cleared the agents of any wrongdoing, and, according to McNary’s close reading of the audit, the agents were no longer actually chasing the truck when the fatal collision occurred. “It was a high-speed following,” McNary testified.

Birdsall, relying on a local police report and eyewitness testimony, said the pursuit car was about three-quarters of a mile from the truck when the accident occurred.

Earlier reports estimated that the truck was traveling about 80 m.p.h. through the intersection, but Birdsall and INS officials now concur that the speed was closer to 65 m.p.h.

INS officials have declined to name the agents in the pursing Border Patrol sedan, citing privacy guidelines, but internal documents obtained by The Times identify the officers as Jose M. Renteria, the driver, and Craig C. Lane, who sat in the passenger seat and communicated via radio with dispatchers in the Temecula Border Patrol station.

The supervising agent at the time was Wesley B. Vanderheyden, documents show.

Packard called for a speedy redesign of the checkpoints, both of which are in his district, to include physical barriers to discourage high-speed chases.

He also blamed Congress for forcing state and local governments to provide social services for undocumented workers while recently deleting an appropriation for 200 more Border Patrol agents.

“It is this type of schizophrenic policy that is causing our border to leak like a sieve,” Packard said.

Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Coronado), whose district includes all of California’s border with Mexico, praised the effectiveness and “heroism” of the Border Patrol agents, whom he likened to a small group of agents “confronting an absolute army of smugglers.” Hunter has long supported shifting agents from the more inland checkpoint stations to the border itself, where he has been instrumental in reinforcing the border fence and making road improvements to increase agents’ mobility.

The existing pursuit policy was already under review when the Temecula incident occurred, according to McNary.

Detailed operational instructions still must be worked out with Border Patrol Council, the agents’ union.

T.J. Bonner, the union’s national president, called the new policy “unrealistic” and “ineffectual” and said it was issued merely to “placate the public.”

Although Bonner warned that elements of the new policy must still be negotiated, he said the union has no real veto power over the thrust of the new rules.

During the negotiation process, the old pursuit policy remains in effect, said Michael Williams, national chief of the Border Patrol. But supervisors have been informed of the tighter restrictions and “are sensitive to the Temecula incident,” Williams said. He predicted that the new rules will be in force by the end of the year.