Backers of jailed border agents appeal to Bush

If President Bush does not pardon Ramos and Compean, then he is no friend of integrity, common sense, or justice. This sin of omission gives credence to his many critics who regularly impugn his character. Justice demands a pardon for these men!!!! President Bush, make one of the last acts of your Administration one that reflects your ability to stand for what is right and good, and pardon Ramos & Compean. And as far as District Attorney John Sutton --- it is people like you who are a disgrace to your profession. It is people like you who make lawyers one of the most hated professions. You twist and pervert justice with legal contortions until the outcome is chaos with the good punished and the evil triumphing to do more evil yet another day.

Great story as usual it just amazes me that this has gone this far. What else does the Soon to be Ex President need to see about this in order to do the right thing? Johnny Sutton can question all he wants on the sentence but I cannot believe he even sleeps at night knowing he is a major reason that these guys have had to go through this. Bush it is time to do something right in your final days and Set these Patriots free.

..."the two men were convicted of violating the civil rights of the fleeing suspect". Could we be a little more specific of what this "suspect" civil rights were. Did he have the right to smuggle drugs into the US? Did he have the right to flee authorized agents, resisting arrest? Did the agents have any rights? Can they only shoot at someone if they are actually shot, or shot at or none of the above? This reeks of an inside political crusade to destroy these men or add to the attorney's resume. If these men are not pardoned for doing their duty, then Bush, Cheny, the prosecutor, and all their cohorts can go to hell! They are no better than there haters.

Pres Bush, pardon these men. As far as I'm concerned, your Presidency has been, these last 4 yrs, pretty worthless in certain subjects, particularly illegal aliens, giving my grand daughters future away with these idiotic bailouts and your turning away from your conservative roots. Pardoning these men would make me, and a millions of other Americans proud of you for doing the right thing before you depart. Do IT, do the right thing.

(Here is the third attempt at writing a comment; hopefully I will get it written before it gets erased when the website ‘refreshes’. I’m using an external editor and will cut and paste to foil the time limit on comments. Ha!) I, too, used to think those two men were unjustly imprisoned and signed the petitions and even went so far as to write directly to the President to plea for a pardon for them. I sent their case to many friends, asking them to do the same. That was before I was made aware that I didn’t have possession of all the facts, however. I have a Google alert set to watch the news for any stories about them and one day, recently, this story came up: http://www.thelibertypapers.org/2009/01/06/ramos-and-compean-should-not-be-pardoned/ At first I was outraged. How could a conservative be so insensitive to the plight of law enforcement agents who were doing their jobs and protecting our borders against scum-bag drug dealers? Well, there are laws of conduct for our police, too, and thank God for them else we would all be cowering whenever we saw a law enforcement agent. It seems that these two border guards were not alone in the desert that night, the scum bag had surrendered and was surrounded by several border agents when one of these two struck him with his shotgun, knocking him to the ground. The suspect (nobody had yet looked into the van, so it was not known at the time what was in it) then saw he was in danger, perhaps for his life, and ran. Only those two shot at him – a total of fifteen times, hitting him just once (1 out of 15? Should they even have guns?). After the incident and against regulations, they cleaned the ‘crime scene’ of all traces of gun fire and colluded on a cover-up, denying the shooting entirely. It was only the reports of the other agents that lead investigators to see something was terribly wrong. Anyway, read the whole story, something that is sadly lacking in all these pleas for their release. Maybe, like me, you too will conclude that you might not have been in possession of all the facts. I wrote again to the President, withdrawing my plea for their pardon. I suggested a commutation might be more in line with justice, though, due to the harsh mandatory sentencing they received. Funny how a few new facts can change the whole story, ain’t it?

President Bush please pardon these agents. I know they messed up but they need another chance. If they continue in those jails they are going to be killed.

When police violate the law, they must be held accountable. There should be no pardon.

The man shot by Ramos and Compean was an illegal migrant actively engaged in drug smuggling. The penalties levied upon Ramos and Compean are more severe than the ones that the drug dealer received. They have served enough time to get the point across to CBP about adhering to their service policies on use of force. These men must be pardoned.

We should put all the police in jail and let the criminals out. Then we would have a society with no civil or legal problems, right!! Have we gone nuts?? We are fast going the route of the Roman empire. Let's pardon these two today. They should have been rewarded for shooting that SOB, not put in jail.

Awatts and Roger47, you obviously don't know the details of the story and choose to believe the prosecutors arguments and propaganda. The agents didn't leave a poor injured man suffering on the border. The drug smuggler kept running to Mexico with the bullet in him and jumped into a van waiting on the other side. Every law enforcement officer who works under these dangerous conditions should now fear for his life from two enemies: the smugglers and our own government. Do you know how many people shoot guns on the border, so many you can't even count. Agents are supposed to report any shots heard or fired. If they did that agents would spend their entire life filling out paperwork, while terrorists and drug smugglers get a free pass.

There is something odd about President Bush's preference to Mexico. This incident and the failed immigration initiative reflect political blindness to Mexico's corruption. In light of a recent article in the El Paso Times - Mexico is one of two countries that "bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse," according to a report by the U.S. Joint Forces Command on worldwide security threats. It would seem that, like the soldier in the field, the two agents knew more about the enemy than the Commander in Chief.

Roger47: As opposed to civilians violating the law should not be held accountable and should be pardoned? Justice seems to be relative to the agenda of the mainstream media these days. If they don't take your case, don't expect any clemency from the courts.

The cowardly act of putting American Border Guard Hero one and Hero Two needs to come to an end. This act caused much of the disarray among Republicans who gave up on the President after ramming a conviction through the courts. When many Republicans saw American heroes convicted and drug dealer free, faith ended.

President Bush, Now is the time to show real leadership and do what you know is right in your heart. Don't be swayed by the bureacratic nit-pickers in your administration who cannot see the forest for the trees. Set these men free. God bless.

American children (and adults) die every day in this country from drugs illegally smuggled across our borders from Mexico and other countries. The smugglers do this with increasing impunity and their foreign bosses live lives of utter luxury, like sheiks and kings. We need to put the FEAR of death into these criminals. Our law enforcement officers should not be hampered by the fear of being prosecuted by their own country while protecting us from them. This is truly a WAR on the drug lords south of our borders, and should be prosecuted as such. Otherwise, the drug lords will win and our children and our citizens will be the ultimate losers.