Promoted by Steven D.
Like all the other institutional failures being ascribed to cultures, such as the NY Fed, VA hospitals, etc? Or is the job/mission just too darn tough to expect zero failures? Does the fact that only two Presidents have been shot in the past hundred plus years indicate that the Secret Service does a fine job or has mostly been lucky? Lucky that Lynette Fromme waved a gun without firing and Sara Jane Moore fired and missed? It’s interesting to note that Moore came to the attention of the Secret Service before she shot at President Ford on September 22, 1975:
Moore had been evaluated by the Secret Service earlier in 1975, but agents decided that she posed no danger to the President. She had been picked up by police on an illegal handgun charge the day before the Ford incident, but was released. The police confiscated her .44 caliber revolver and 113 rounds of ammunition.
(Cont. below the fold …)
Not so different from the recent WH fence jumper as reported by WAPO.
Four days after the incident, a look back shows that Gonzalez had come to the Secret Service’s attention twice earlier this year.
Once detained by VA police when he was found to have an arsenal in his trunk and a map with a line pointed to the WH. The Secret Service interviewed and cleared him. In August he was hanging around the WH fence with a hatchet in his waistband. Fully aware of the earlier incident, the official said, “he did not exhibit any mental-health issues at that point. He had not engaged in any criminal activity.” Gonzalez was let go.
Just your ordinary, everyday armed USian.
With this incident freshly in mind along with the recent Secret Service agents partying in advance of the Presidential detail, WAPO did a bit of reporting this weekend into a 2011 incident: Secret Service Stumbled After Gunman Hit White House Residence in 2011. As far as it goes, it’s a decent report and definitely worth reading. The Secret Service does not fare well in it. But it begs a few questions.
First, why did it take almost three years to put this story together? Was it embargoed until new security measures, such as ShotSpotter, were in place and functioning? Or held back not to give a potential copycat any ideas?
Second, how does it compare to the original report, Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez arrested after shots fired near White House? The differences are striking beginning with shots fired near White House and not that shots hit the White House. Then there were the assurances. Just an unexplained nut:
One official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is continuing, said Ortega-Hernandez’s alleged motive may have been anger. “He hates the president, he hates Washington, he hates society,” the official said.
A lone wolf (isn’t it always in the good ole USA? Except for the assassination of Lincoln, of course.):
Ortega-Hernandez has a record of arrests for relatively minor offenses in Texas, Utah and Idaho, authorities said, but he has not been linked to any radical organizations.
A revealing, and most troubling aspect to me, of the first report was:
In trying to determine why he traveled to the nation’s capital from the western part of the country, investigators also found no connection between him and the Occupy D.C. protest, according to three law enforcement officials familiar with the case.
How much time and effort was the Secret Service devoting to a perceived threat from Occupy D.C? Hatchetman with a sawed-off shotgun, two sniper rifles, an assault rifle, a bolt-action rifle, one intact shotgun and five handguns, no threat. Occupy D.C, very scary.
The latest report reveals another perceived threat:
Amid conflicting radio chatter, including a Secret Service dispatcher calling into 911 with contradictory descriptions of vehicles and suspects, police began looking for the wrong people: two black men supposedly fleeing down Rock Creek Parkway.
Very scary black men. Not that there’s ever been a black assassin of a POTUS (who lives a majority African-American city), but I guess, you never know.
Should we make anything of the names of the two perps? Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez and Omar Jose Gonzalez? Not exactly what I would expect to see as would-be assassins of the first black POTUS. Possibly not even what the Secret Service is seeing in the large volume of threats being made against Obama. Hope it’s just on odd coincidence.
Arrest Warrant for Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez dated Nov. 17, 2011.
Document Type: Magistrate
Filing Date: 02/07/2012
Case Title: SW THE RESIDENCE OF OSCAR RAMIRO ORTEGA-HERNANDEZ LOCATED AT 2984 MESQUITO DRIVE, IDAHO FALLS, IDAHO
Case Number: 11-1052M
Document Number and Title: 5. Order granting Motion to Unseal Case
○ Press release U.S. Attorney: Idaho Man Sentenced to 25 Years in Prison
The gunman fired the shots from a distance of 700 meters. Specs of Romanian Cugir SA semi-automatic AK-47 model. Perhaps is was a sniper rifle version, see my first link above.
As the number of young men in the US that fit a similar profile is so huge, didn’t find it interesting enough to include in the diary beyond providing links to the story. Plus identifying which of those men will act is an impossible task. They exist within a culture that tolerates and exalts violence and guns; so, it’s not rational for us to be surprised when one of them goes active. Practically an everyday occurrence when we include the victims that aren’t public figures.
My take away was that this was not so much a Secret Service failure as a Secret Sevice LEADERSHIP failure.
If you read the article;
So the actual agents who’s job it is to protect the grounds did their jobs. They reacted, and were ready. Almost certainly if someone had stormed the WH, they would have been stopped.. It was the supervisor, now gone, that failed here. And apparently the culture of leadership did not allow the on site agents to later contradict their bosses.
Since that time, the leadership, including the top, has been changed.
Also, as far as the fence jumper. Would we be happier if the Secret Service had shot dead a guy armed with only a knife? The First Family was not there. What they guy was basically doing is running into the arms of the agents inside the doors of the WH. Under those circumstances, I’m not going to criticize the Secret Service for showing restraint, and not killing a metally disturbed individual.
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Far more confusion among the SS agents at the time the shots were fired then your listing suggests.
Deference to authority when those on the front line know the authority is wrong and they are being told NOT to do their jobs is considered a culture problem within an institution. No different from what can be heard in the NYFed-GS tapes.
I didn’t criticize the SS in how they handled the fence jumper. Merely questioned their judgment when the guy was found with an arsenal in his trunk and loitering around the WH with a hatchet in his waistband.
I never said you did criticize the SS on the fence jumper, in fact I did not read your post at all, and was in no way addressing it.
I was responding to the original poster.
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More on the “fence jumper” incident from WAPO: White House fence-jumper made it far deeper into building than previously known.
SOP sort of broke down in this fence jumping incident which is apparently more frequent than one would have guessed.
Just curious. Is the report still in there of the Secret Service radio chatter including an order to “Stand down.” during a period of confusion? Or was that from the most recent invasion incident a week ago?
Excellent questions, Steven D.
My question is of the timing of this related to the nationwide forcible shutdown of the Occupy movement coordinated through the Police Executives Research Foundation, which includes reps from US DOJ and DHS Federal Protective Services.
I promoted this one, I cannot take credit for writing it.
The reported “stand down” order was from the 2011 shooting incident. If true, would still need a timeline to consider if it was a large or small error.
Occupy DC was in operation on 11/11/11. My point in highlighting that Occupy DC was mentioned in the first report of the WH shooting is that the USG agencies always do extensive threat assessments of leftist peaceful organizations and not so much on those that espouse violence.
“My point in highlighting that Occupy DC was mentioned in the first report of the WH shooting is that the USG agencies always do extensive threat assessments of leftist peaceful organizations and not so much on those that espouse violence”
I don’t think this is accurate based on my experience working for the USG. The first part is quite true but right-wing extremist groups (militias and the like) are taken quite seriously. I recall the vapors over the DHS memo from a few years ago. Occupy seems to be more of an economic threat that makes the wealthy elite uncomfortable and Democratic party politicians are only too happy to crush any kind of 60s era revolt.
One DHS report in 2009 — but note the title: Right-wing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment. If not for the economic meltdown, would as much attention have been given to rightwing extremists? Doubtful — too busy setting up stings on Muslims.
The left, with or without an economic message, is always infiltrated. It’s such an old kneejerk response from the USG that they practically can’t help themselves. Recall that FBI undercover agents were tasked to attend Quaker peace meeting during GWB’s tenure.
Here is the gist of the problem from this story:
I guess it’s the antique chandeliers.
The fence-jumper didn’t have a gun when he made it into the WH. He was stopped with an arsenal in his trunk a month earlier.
Miriam Carey was apparently shot and killed by DC Capitol Police and not the Secret Service.
Lesson #1 for the public, jump the WH fence instead of using a vehicle to try to plow through it. (It was also alleged that a Secret Service agent was injured when he was struck by Carey’s car.)
Lesson #2, very erratic DWB around the WH and Capitol gives the police a license to kill the driver.
Should add that I don’t even want to reveal where the SS story took me when I put my tin-foil hat on.
Of course. The wacko was just a nutjob who might kill a President. Occupy D.C. might topple the entire class system. To the movers and shakers in this country, Barack Obama (or George W. Bush) is expendable. There precious profits and Scrooge McDuck hordes, NEVER.
I don’t believe this is satire.
The Secret Service Isn’t Up to the Job; It’s Time to Give Them Help from the Military
I wonder how long it would take before we would be talking about President-for-Life Allen West?
Not satire? You’re pulling my leg!
Dan Emmett, author of Within Arm’s Length: The Extraordinary Career of a Special Agent in the United States Secret Service
Doesn’t look very satirical to me. Looks like a book promotion tactic.
Lot of wingnuts in the SS it seems.
That would be my guess also, particularly with the top.
Every time I read an article on the Secret Service and they start bragging on how tough they are (stop a bullet, etc), I think
“Ya, tough until you get a subpoena, and then you spill your guts about Democratic POTUS personal lives like the bitches you are”
/
His point that the WH is in a war zone (ISIS, etal. is coming to attack it) is nuts. That assessment is confirmed by his recommendation that the truly screwy Allen West be put in charge of a military operation to protect the WH. Obama may not be entirely safe with his Secret Service detail, but he’s safer with the SS than a militia commanded by West.
They should have investigated the SS 50 yrs ago following that suspiciously sorry job of protecting the president in Dallas. Gross misconduct both at the agent and supervisor levels. Numerous SS rules and procedures violated. Late night drinking by agents, parade route windows not sealed, route itself in violation of proper procedures.
Instead, none were fired let alone prosecuted or investigated, a few were reassigned, one or two promoted. Curious silence by those supposed to oversee the SS.
And the recent incidents suggest a wildly overhyped agency that has been getting by on partly unearned reputation and lack of oversight.
Rachel Maddow covering this SS latest incompetence right now
Have to say that it’s surprising that SS agents aren’t better skilled at immediately identifying the sound of a gun shot. Even if it’s not easy to differentiate between a car backfiring or a firecracker and a gun shot, better always to react as if it’s a gun shot. Didn’t do so at the WH in 2011 or in Dallas in 1963. There was time between the first shot in Dallas that missed and the second shot. Not clear if Youngblood in LBJ’s car responded to the first or second shot. If the first, he’s the only one that did, but he was also the only one close enough to the person he was protecting to do so effectively.
Oh they’re trained to recognize gun shots — and to react to anything resembling shots and not wait for confirmation.
Kellerman sitting in the front passenger seat , upon hearing the first shot(s) (non-fatal) testified that he told the SS driver Greer to “Get out of line!” But Greer instead turned around twice to look at the president, and probably slowed the car down in the process.
A researcher years later, after Greer’s passing, got on the phone with his son and asked him whether Greer liked JFK. He got a long pause, then, “Well, Dad was Protestant and the president was Catholic.”
Interestingly too, Greer got favorable treatment, and a sort of cushy WH job to go with his other SS duties, when Lyndon took over. Johnson apparently thought highly of him …
Jackie did not.
Agents sitting in the follow up car were supposedly told by their supervisor Emory Roberts to stand down following the initial shots.
Interesting that (per researcher Vince Palamara) the SS agents drinking late into the early morning hours were all assigned to the president’s detail, including Clint Hill, while none of the VP’s agents were drinking. SS agent Gerald Behn — who hadn’t taken a day of vacation in the nearly 3 yrs JFK was president — decided (or someone decided for him) to take a few days off during the TX trip. Author Mark Lane says the number of agents asking to be taken off the WH detail in the weeks before the TX trip was about a dozen — and all requests were granted.
Very curious stuff.
Strangely enough, I watched the video of the Dallas motorcade before posting this diary. And glanced through some of Palamara’s stuff.
My take is that Greer responded to the first shot that hit JFK by tapping the brake pedal. A startle response and not what such a driver should have been trained to do. It was also that shot that prompted Kellerman’s command to get out of there. That really was too little too late for such a large and underpowered vehicle.
No way could Clint Hill have been impaired and responded as quickly to the second shot as he did. One problem was that he was assigned to Jackie, and therefore, should have jumped on the left rear position of the JFK’s car and not the right rear. Could be the reason he fell off as Greer began to accelerate. Ready was either too slow to react or never reacted at all. If the former, there was nothing he could have done since Hill had appropriated Ready’s right rear position. So, there would have been no need to call him back.
Conflicting reports as to whether or not JFK’s detail “partied” the night before. Likely against regulations, but organizational cultures often override regs.
The cock-up was not having Don Lawton and Hill on the limousine for the entire motorcade. Why? Seems to be a mystery of conflicting stories on that. If the shots that hit JFK came from the “grassy knoll,” probably wouldn’t have made any difference.
On YouTube in recent years a video was posted showing the presidential party getting into the limo at Love Field, and as the cars slowly begin to pull away to begin the ride to downtown Dallas, you can see a couple of SS agents move to the presidential car to take their places standing on the rear running boards.
Only they are quickly called back by their supervisor (presumably Roberts) in the follow up car. You can clearly see one SS agent (Rybka?) throwing out his arms in a puzzled shrug as if to say, Shouldn’t I be on the president’s car?
InTampa FL a few days before, as with most presidential motorcades, SS agents were stationed on the rear running boards during a parade.
As for Palamara, he’s the leading SS researcher, has been for years. He’s interviewed more SS agents of the time than anyone, and has stayed on the case for decades now. Unfortunately, he’s not a skilled writer, and so much of his work is badly in need of editing. Worth it though to spend time studying his research.
If memory serves, he also reports SS agents in the follow up car were ordered to stand down following the initial shots. He states as confirmed fact that agents were improperly drinking (9 of them, all assigned to JFK) well into the night and early morning hours just before having to report for duty, including Clint Hill.
It was a very short distance — just a few feet — to run, and the sudden sounds of gunfire may have caused a startle reaction in someone like Hill, enough to startle him into reacting. Or possibly he was the type who held his liquor well.
It was Lawton and Hill that were along JFK’s car when it was at Love Field. Hill took his place on the follow-up car running board and Lawton was left behind. (Lawton was behind JFK during the Florida motorcade a few days earlier.) It’s undefined as to exactly what happened during those few seconds. One agent on the right running board moved to sit in the car, presumably to open allow the space for Lawton on the running board. Lawton could have declined it as it was the inferior position. Perhaps he didn’t see that the space was being made for him. Also possible that Roberts didn’t think Lawton was fit to serve that day.
I don’t think anyone thought to secure an in-depth interview with Lawton in the immediate aftermath of the assassination because he hadn’t been there. Checked to see if Palamara got from him and it wasn’t much. Possibly because he thought it was Rybka and not Lawton.
Personally, I think Palamara is digging in a dry well. It was not SOP that agents ride on the back of the limousine. Haven’t seen any protocol for when, where, and why they did. During the Dallas motorcade, Hill did take up the left, rear step on JFK’s car several times when the distance between Jackie and the crowds was narrowed.
Big Q is why were the agents called off the limo running boards at the airport — along with the other security lapses. And in Dallas of all places, a hotbed of rightwing hatred of the president. SOP??? Surely any sober and competent Secret Service would have at least kept the agents on the rear of the limo.
But many odd things happened that day — almost looks like someone elsewhere calling the shots, stripping the SS detail of its potential effectiveness, sprinkling in some planned sluggishness and inexperience.
We might not ever know about some details as the SS disclosed in the mid-90s that they’d destroyed many SS records relating to presidential protection during the fall of 1963 — another curious and disturbing fact.
Same day — Fort Worth motorcade. No SS agents on back bumper. Didn’t seem to be any in San Antonio the day before either.
Look closely enough at any unique event and curious things always seem to emerge — because that’s the nature of unique events. Put it in context of similar events and the curiosities begin not to seem so unique.
Actually looks like there’s an agent at least walking along near the right rear of that different pres limo. I notice too two motorcycle police riding close to the car on the right — where they should be, not pulled back well behind the car as in Dallas.
Many strange things re security happened in Dallas, a city well-known by Nov 63 as rather unsafe for liberal Dem pols (as with the Oct 63 incident of picketers striking Amb Stevenson). I’ve mentioned some here, but there are many more.
After a while, a reasonable person would have to conclude the SS and overall security that day (including peculiar “stand down” security from the Dallas Sheriffs, normally a part of local presidential protection) was grossly negligent.
Agents of the time interviewed by Palamara have alluded to this, along with some concluding there was a conspiracy that day. Even moderate mainstream Judge John Tunheim, head of the ARRB and trying not to sound an explicit conspiracy note, asserted that security for JFK was very bad in Dallas.
But he couldn’t get add’l needed SS records of the time because the agency destroyed them in 1995 after being notified by the congressionally-established Board to preserve and produce.
At what point do you add up the major curiosities and strange actions and inactions and say there seem to be a few too many?
Sorry, but I don’t think Palamara’s evidence is as strong as you do. Plus, even if I did, there’s still a huge leap from “grossly negligent” to intentionally negligent. (He went on the History Channel and claimed that the SS agent left behind at Love Field was Rybck. How could any reputable researcher make such a gross error?)
Should mention that I have yet to be convinced by any of the proposed narratives. Not the lone gunman in the TSBD nor any of the alternatives. All of them are based on weak, incomplete, and/or faulty data/evidence and ignore conflicting evidence, most of which isn’t all that good either.
Pull on any thread in the JFK assassination and quickly gets very strange if not downright spooky. And that’s just the solid and verifiable facts.
Consider one. JFK fired Allen Dulles. Mary Bancroft and Dulles had a long-term affair. Bancroft’s best friend was Ruth Forbes Paine Young. Her daughter-in-law was Ruth Paine. Does any of that mean anything wrt to JFK’s assassination?
And “large and underpowered vehicle”??? I thought the pres limo was built specially not only for armored protection but had a particularly powerful engine to handle the extra weight. First I’ve ever heard that that very expensive and carefully engineered limo was “underpowered”.
And things were “too little too late” only when, some 3-4 seconds or so after Kellerman’s order to move out, and as Greer continued to slow the vehicle, the fatal shot from the front hit its mark.
As for agents on the rear of the limo making a difference,they almost certainly would have jumped inside to shield the president after the first shot hit him in the back; the fatal grassy knoll shot only came 4-5 seconds later.
This was 1963. SS-100-X Big car with 350-horsepower 430 cubic inch Ford MEL engine.
Too many “what ifs” to consider. And I have no expertise in any of them. I can’t even wrap my brain around why a sniper in Oswald’s alleged position would wait for the car to turn onto Elm before firing.
Not disputing that an agent standing on the rear bumper couldn’t have covered JFK after he’d first been hit, but had an agent been on the bumper and the bullet came from the TBD, it would have hit the agent and not JFK.
Fifty-one years on and as yet, JFK’s injuries are still fuzzy and inconclusive which leaves open the question of where the shots had to have been fired from.
I’m no scientist, but I know anthropocentric global warming is a fact.
I’m not an expert in any of the technical areas of the JFK case, but I know the security that day was appallingly bad, criminally so. I’m also satisfied shots that hit the president came from both the front and rear that day, the fatal one being the last from the direction of the knoll.
Per Maddow, looks like the House Oversight Comm’ee is going to investigate tomorrow, calling only the SS Director.
Normally good news, except that the committee is headed by Darrel Issa and this one is likely going to at least help partly rehab his damaged credibility from Benghazi etc.
Does the senate have any role here?
Does Congress have any role in anything anymore? Other than holding hearings, writing reports, and filing them in what for all practical purposes is the round file.
If it’s the House, the story and the investigation by Issa look like a set-up.
Senate Homeland Security Committee should have a role because the SS is now in DHS.
Could Issa be going after Jeh Johnson before he possibly is named to something else, say Attorney General?
Sorry this stuff right before an election that by rights should be talking about minimum wage and Obamacare is starting to make me a bit tin-foily.
Especially on the day that the Supreme Court majority interposed itself into yet another election. And a former SS security consultant is plumping Allen West to handle protection of the President. And a war just conveniently got whomped up by John McCain and Lindsey Graham with the help of a bunch of snuff film videographers in Syria.
If anything can possibly in anyway be used to smear Obama, Issa is on it. So far he’s zero for twenty or more. So partisan that if he were playing poker, he’d bet everything on a ten high.
Always good to keep one’s tin-foil hat within easy reach.
McCain hates Obama — the man that in McCain’s mind thwarted his move into the WH. But Obama’s bipartisan fetish has allowed the old fool to carry on. Like HST’s comment that the old good Republican are those pushing up the daisies.
Any opportunity to reduce minority voting, the SCOTUS fab-five are on it. That said, I’m not a fan of early or convenience absentee voting. Would prefer that campaigns end and voting begins over two or three days and legitimate absentee ballots be mailed on voting days.
From WAPO Armed contractor with criminal record was on elevator with Obama in Atlanta
This isn’t a minor security lapse, but a major violation of protocol. The Secret Service does background checks anyone that will be in close contact with the President anywhere he goes. Those that don’t pass the screening aren’t allowed to attend. SS also checks for weapons which also aren’t allowed. The only exception is local police and federal officers who have already passed such checks. Private security contractors do not fall within the exception.
In this case, the SS wouldn’t have known of the lapse if the “security contractor” hadn’t acted suspiciously.
Not until the “security contractor’s” supervisor showed up and fired him on the spot were SS agents aware that the man carried a gun.
Lucky for all involved that the “security contractor” intended no harm to anyone that day.
Would seriously consider that there was at least of faction in the SS that didn’t appreciate having Pierson in that position. Very difficult for a woman promoted to the top slop in any organization that has historically been male dominated to succeed unless she is both highly competent and well-liked and supported by those in the ranks.