Prison transfer urged for 2 agents

Two congressmen from California yesterday called on the head of the Federal Bureau of Prisons to meet with imprisoned former Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean and consider transferring them to a minimum-security facility.

Republican Reps. Duncan Hunter and Dana Rohrabacher said they told Bureau of Prisons Director Harley G. Lappin that they were concerned about the safety of the former agents, one of whom has been assaulted by fellow inmates.

“Agents Ramos and Compean have been segregated from the general prison population for their own safety,” Mr. Hunter said. “The necessity for this action was demonstrated by the attack against agent Ramos once inmates discovered he was a Border Patrol agent.

“If agents Ramos and Compean must continue serving their sentences, then they should be moved to a minimum-security facility where they will not be threatened and under such restrictive conditions,” he said.

Ramos and Compean were sentenced in October 2006 to 11- and 12-year prison terms, respectively, for the February 2005 shooting of Osvaldo Aldrete-Davila, a Mexican national who ran from the agents after abandoning a van loaded with 743 pounds of marijuana near Fabens, Texas.

The agents testified during trial that they thought Mr. Aldrete-Davila had a weapon.

Mr. Aldrete-Davila, 27, has since been arrested by U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents in El Paso, Texas, on a federal grand-jury indictment charging him with conspiracy and possession with the intent to bring a second load of marijuana into the country.

The indictment said he brought 752 pounds of marijuana into the U.S. in October 2005, eight months after he had been shot by the agents.

The case against the agents is under appeal. The agents want the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn the convictions.

Both agents are confined to their cells for 23 hours a day and are restricted from any activities afforded to inmates in the general population.

Mr. Hunter and Mr. Rohrabacher have called on President Bush to pardon the two agents. They accused Mr. Bush of being “arrogant and heartless” for refusing to pardon or commute the sentences.

Mr. Hunter, a former presidential candidate, introduced a bill last year to pardon the agents. The measure is pending.

“These agents were convicted solely on the testimony of the drug dealer, who has since been indicted on federal drug charges for running drugs into the United States while serving as a federal witness,” he said.

In January, Rep. Bill Delahunt, Massachusetts Democrat and chairman of the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on international organizations, human rights and oversight, called the sentences “profoundly disproportionate” and urged that the agents be pardoned.

The White House has said Mr. Bush would review pardon petitions on a case-by-case basis. Mr. Hunter said he talked with Mr. Lappin yesterday about the transfers and was assured the prisons director would review the cases.

“After 14 months of enduring the harsh conditions of solitary confinement, Mr. Lappin should do the right thing and exercise his authority to move the agents into more humane conditions,” Mr. Rohrabacher said. “They are effectively serving a double sentence for an unjust conviction that may very well be overturned.”