What Really Happened in Border Shooting?

Former U.S. Border Patrol Agent David Ham points toward the location at Fabens, Texas, on Monday, Feb. 5, 2007, where former Border Patrol Agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean shot drug smuggler Osvaldo Davila last year. The agents began serving prison sentences in January after their convictions in the incident. (AP Photo/Mark Lambie) (Mark Lambie - AP)

FABENS, Texas -- The prairie where it all happened is quiet now, but for the occasional Border Patrol vehicle passing by. A sign rests near a muddy ditch, "Stop Illegal Immigration," left behind by protesters who have visited in homage to two ex-agents, imprisoned for shooting a drug smuggler in the backside as he sprinted toward Mexico.

It seems almost unimaginable that one moment in this lonely place ignited the furor that rages still _ from the blogosphere to Congress _ two years later.

A jury convicted the agents of assault, obstruction of justice and civil rights violations. A federal judge meted out punishment: 12 years for Jose Alonso Compean; 11 for Ignacio "Nacho" Ramos. As the two men surrendered last month, demonstrators took to the streets, clutching U.S. flags and shrieking: "What kind of America do we have?"

There have been claims of betrayal, hateful phone calls to prosecutors, warnings to President Bush from some fellow Republicans in Congress about taking sides with "the American people or ... our enemies" _ even threats of impeachment.

Online petitions have demanded an independent probe and a pardon.

"Commended illegal immigration heroes," one Web site christened the convicted officers, whose supporters are disgusted that the so-called victim _ "a doper" _ went free, while the agents sit behind bars for "doing their job."

But what happened that February day in 2005 _ and what's happened since _ isn't as black and white as the us vs. them spin on the airwaves and the Internet, where facts are fleeting in the ever emotional debate over the nation's borders.

Consider one fact missing from the cyberspace chatter: In the El Paso Border Patrol sector, where Compean and Ramos were assigned, agents have fired their weapons 14 times in the line of duty since 2001 _ including four fatal shootings. In one incident, a 19-year-old Mexican immigrant was shot to death by agents after he brandished a metal pipe.

Each of those shootings, except one, was ruled a justifiable use of force, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office in San Antonio _ a "good shoot," in Border Patrol parlance.

The exception was the Compean-Ramos case. What set it apart, a federal prosecutor told jurors at their trial: "They knew it was a bad shoot."

This case is different not simply because of the debate it inflamed but, as an Associated Press review of court documents, transcripts and exhibits shows, because of what transpired in a few life-changing moments out on that lonely prairie.

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