“Allegations of employee misconduct that are entered into Department of Homeland Security (DHS) case management systems are assigned one of several case allegation types; however, there is no primary use of force designation. As a result, we were unable to identify the total number of excessive force allegations and investigations involving CBP employees,” the just-released report said.

The inspector general began investigating incidents of excessive force in 2012 after media reports about an undocumented immigrant dying in 2010 while in Customs and Border Patrol custody in Southern California. Congressional calls for an investigation followed the stories.

Some 21,000 records of possible excessive force incidents were turned over to investigators, who narrowed their review down to just over 2,000 records that seemed most likely to indicate excessive force from 2007 to 2012. It found 1,323 that might include excessive force or use of force. (See below)

The agency’s own tracking of use of force reports, which began in 2010 to “gain insight into use of force trends, training, and equipment needs,” but is not used “for discipline purposes,” showed 1,188 use of force incidents in 2011 and 935 in 2012 — mostly with border patrol and most involving “less than lethal devices.”

The inspector general investigation concluded that Customs and Border Patrol did an acceptable job of use-of-force training even as the size of its workforce expanded significantly during the years studied.

Results of an internal review of use of force that the agency began after the media reports was included in the inspector general’s report, but was largely redacted.

The three recommendations made in the report:

• CBP should work with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to implement a method to identify excessive force allegations in its case management system.
• Develop processes to incorporate information regarding assaults on agents that do not result in the use of force into its analysis of use of force incidents.
• Evaluate and act upon field audit results.

The inspector general’s office said it would also “modify its case management system to identify in greater detail incidents involving excessive use of force allegations.”

The report from the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general found:

• Inadequate ground resources in place to support the craft.
• The seven craft have only flown 37% of the projected number of hours — and despite this, two new $18 million aircraft were ordered.
• A multi-million-dollar maintenance funding shortfall that could lead to curtailed missions.
• There is no formal process in place for other agency “stakeholders,” such as the FBI and Department of Defense, to request missions on their behalf and does not have agreements on being reimbursed for the costs of those missions. 

One of the unmanned aircraft used by the border patrol. SOURCE: Inspector general’s report.