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BISBEE — Surveillance cameras recorded the deadly shooting of a Mexican man by a U.S. Border Patrol agent last Friday, despite an earlier statement from a Border Patrol spokesman suggesting there was no video of the incident.
In a statement issued Thursday, the Cochise County Sheriff’s Office, which is investigating the case, said it had received a digital videotape of the shooting from the Border Patrol.
The chief of the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector, Michael Nicley, confirmed that the shooting had been recorded and said a spokesman had been unaware of the recording when asked about it by the Herald/Review earlier this week.
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“As soon as we got (the tape), we turned it over to the agencies investigating,” Nicley said. “But (the spokesman) was unaware.”
The FBI also is investigating the incident, in which Francisco Javier Dominguez-Rivera, 22, was killed last Friday after he and six others jumped a border fence between Naco and Douglas.
On Wednesday, the Herald/Review reported that the Border Patrol maintains a surveillance tower close to the location of the shooting. Tucson Sector spokesman Gustavo Soto, however, said agents at the Border Patrol’s Naco station were surprised when asked if a recording existed.
“When I spoke to the agents in Naco, they were unfamiliar with there even being a tower in the area,” Soto said. “As far as we know, there was no video taken of the incident itself.”
Sheriff Larry Dever did not want to comment on the quality of the video or its contents, but Nicley said it was inconclusive.
“You can’t tell anything from the tape at all,” he said. “You can barely even make out the bodies.”
Nicley said the Border Patrol is trying to have the tape digitally enhanced to show more detail.
According to an article posted on the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Web site, the camera technology used by the Border Patrol allows agents to read license plates on cars two miles away and to detect and track human movement up to three miles away.
The shooting took place at approximately 3:15 Friday when a Border Patrol agent from the Naco station responded to a call of seven people crossing the desert.
As the agent was taking the group into custody, he was reportedly hit or pushed by Dominguez-Rivera. The agent, who thought his life was in danger, shot and killed the man, the Border Patrol said.
Lt. Cmdr. Mark Dannels, a sheriff’s office spokesman, said the shooting was triggered by a rock-throwing episode.
Reached by telephone at his home in Cuautla in the south-central Mexican state of Morelos, Renato Dominguez, father of the victim, said that he knew few details about the incident.
Dominguez said his son, who was traveling with two brothers and a sister-in-law at the time of his death, had gone to the United States to look for work, not for trouble.
“If you were to come down here and ask anybody, they would tell you that he was absolutely not the type of kid to be violent,” Dominguez said.
An autopsy of Dominguez-Rivera was conducted Wednesday, but results have not been released.
The shooting has been condemned by Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Mexico’s Foreign Relations Department.
The agent, whose identity has not been released, is on paid administrative leave while the case is pending.
nicole ray wrote on Jun 21, 2009 3:35 PM: