INS Clears Agents in Fatal Temecula Crash

Two Border Patrol agents involved in a chase in which a stolen Chevrolet Suburban carrying illegal immigrants crashed and killed six people in Temecula complied with agency policy and should not be blamed for the crash, top immigration officials said Tuesday.

A report released in Washington by the Immigration and Naturalization Service’s director of internal investigations largely supports previous official accounts of the June 2 accident, which provoked an angry debate about Border Patrol chases and freeway immigration checkpoints.

The crash killed one of the 12 illegal immigrants in the truck, four students and a father driving his son to school.

John Chase, the director of the INS’ Office of Internal Audit, said the crash was caused by the driver of the truck and an alleged immigrant smuggler who was trying to elude the agents. The investigation found the agents slowed their vehicle more than a mile from the high school where the crash occurred after their emergency lights and siren failed, Chase said.

The driver has been charged with six counts of murder by local authorities, who so far have said the agents acted properly.

“Two very sophisticated smugglers share full responsibility for this tragedy,” Chase said. “In this particular case, the agents acted extremely responsibly.”

But Chase said top officials are continuing a review of Border Patrol chase policies and will probably make changes to improve supervisors’ control over pursuits, communications between INS units during pursuits and communication between the INS and other law enforcement agencies.

The city of Temecula, 70 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border, has sued the INS in an attempt to prohibit chases in the city and some residents and immigrant rights advocates have criticized the agency for chasing suspects off freeways into populated residential areas.

Although Chase said he discovered no errors contributing to the Temecula crash, he said he did find “things that could have been done better.”

For example, the report revealed that the pursuing agents got off the freeway by driving the wrong way on an on-ramp after the truck took an off-ramp.

The Border Patrol sedan was following the speeding truck at 35 m.p.h. to 40 m.p.h. and was about eight-tenths of a mile behind when the crash occurred, the report said.