INS to Review Agents’ Use of Lethal Force : The Border: Recent shootings spur immigration commissioner to call for review of policy.

In the wake of a series of controversial shootings by Border Patrol officers, federal Immigration and Naturalization Commissioner Gene McNary has called for an unprecedented review of lethal force procedures used by immigration agents

“Escalating violence on the southern border has resulted in injuries and even deaths,” McNary said in a statement issued in Washington. “The review I have directed will begin immediately to determine what steps the INS can take to eliminate or dramatically reduce these incidents.”

Immigrant advocate groups, who have long contended that Border Patrol officers are too quick to pull their triggers, commended the action as a necessary “first step,” in the words of Roberto Martinez, border representative in San Diego for the American Friends Service Committee, the social action arm of the Quaker Church.

But Martinez noted that the commissioner took no action against alleged instances of non-lethal abuse--such as beatings and the destruction of immigrants’ documents--which he said are common complaints. In addition, Martinez and others have noted that immigration service reforms would do nothing to revise a perceived hesitancy on the part of local prosecutors to bring criminal abuse charges against federal agents.

“The problem runs a lot deeper than lethal force, although nothing else is as bad as that,” Martinez said.

Immigration authorities plan to evaluate a broad range of alternatives, including the use of non-lethal defensive weapons and the issuance of helmets and safety glasses to officers, the first-year commissioner said. McNary traced the violence to “bandits, armed smugglers of drugs and people, and rock-throwing gangs.”

Officials said that all alternatives will be looked at, including the use of rubber bullets and stun guns. Human rights monitors said introducing such weapons would not improve the situation.

“Stun guns and rubber bullets are out,” Martinez said.

Violence has been most pronounced in the San Diego area, the largest single entry point for undocumented immigrants entering the United States from Mexico. Almost 800 Border Patrol agents are based in San Diego, the largest deployment in the nation.

In the past year, agents posted along the California-Mexico border have shot at least seven people, killing four of them. Thieves have killed at least nine more, police say.

U.S. Border Patrol officials say attacks against agents have also increased dramatically, particularly by rock throwers. The number of assaults against agents rose from 60 in fiscal 1989 to 217 in fiscal 1990, said Gustavo de la Vina, chief patrol agent in San Diego.

“This is what we’ve had to resort to,” De la Vina said at Border Patrol headquarters in San Diego Thursday, pointing to a vehicle that has been outfitted with grates to protect occupants and windows from rock attacks.

In the most recent case, a Border Patrol agent in Calexico shot a 15-year-old Mexican boy, Eduardo Garcia Zamores, as he was atop the border fence separating Calexico from Mexicali, Mexico.

The agent, whose name has been withheld, has maintained that the boy was poised to throw a rock at the agent. The boy and several witnesses have said the boy had no rock in his hand, and that the shooting was unprovoked.

Calexico police and the FBI are still investigating the Nov. 18 incident.

Duke Austin, an INS spokesman in Washington, said the boy’s shooting was one of several recent controversial cases that had prompted the commissioner to order a review of lethal-force procedures.

“We’re very aware of what happened in Calexico,” Austin said, “but that was not the single catalyst.”

The Border Patrol, like other law enforcement agencies, requires that agents refrain from using lethal force except to save their lives or the lives of innocent third parties.