#FastAndFurious : Murdered Border Patrol Agent armed with *beanbags*

**Posted by Phineas

Oh, for Pete’s sake!

The Justice Department on Monday unsealed an indictment charging five individuals allegedly involved in Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s death, and announced a reward of up to $1 million for information leading to the arrest of those suspects still at large.

For the first time, federal officials also revealed that Terry and an elite squad of federal agents initially fired bean bags — not bullets — at a heavily armed drug cartel crew in the mountains south of Tucson in December 2011 (sic). During the exchange, Terry was shot and killed.

(The original article contains a typo. Brian Terry was murdered in 2010, not 2011.)

It’s not clear from the article why Terry and his colleagues were using bean bags instead of firearms. Were they required to by department policy? Were they allowed to escalate to bullets only after being shot at? Was it their choice, and they just made a disastrously wrong decision?

Regardless, that bean bags were even an option is ludicrous. Arizona is prime territory for cartel smuggling; these gangs are armed with heavy weapons and are quite willing to use them. Border Patrol agents should be armed and ready to use deadly force from the moment of first contact.

The cartels sure are.

PS: And let’s not forget that the weapons used against Agent Terry and his team were supplied by the United States government. The cartels get assault rifles, while our guys get beans.

via Gateway Pundit

(Crossposted at Public Secrets)