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Tag Archives: DEA
Team Kimberlin Post of the Day
Here’s another installment in the Saga of The Dread Pirate Kimberlin detailing another of his accomplishments. It’s provided for those of you who are new to the story.
During his 20s, Brett Kimberlin was a very successful businessman. In addition to a heath food store and a restaurant, he operated an import business. He imported marijuana. In large wholesale quantities. By 1978, he was bringing it in by the ton.
In February, 1979, he was in Texas to receive a DC-4 load of dope at a makeshift airfield. However, the weather was such that the pilots couldn’t find the field. They were directed by air traffic controllers to a real airport. Rather than land with bales of marijuana on board, they began dumping their load over south Texas. Kimberlin and his crew wound up being busted by local cops in Kleberg County who turned Kimberlin over to the DEA.
Mark Singer’s book Citizen K records this conversation (p. 108) that supposedly occurred while Kimberlin was being driven to Corpus Christi by the narcs:
“What are we under arrest for?”
“Conspiracy with intent to possess and distribute marijuana,” one agent replied.
“What marijuana?” asked Kimberlin.
“We got your airplane,” said the other agent.
“What airplane?”
“Your pot was scattered all over south Texas.”
“What pot?’
Indeed, over 5 tons of Kimberlin’s dope in 45 pound bales were strewn across several counties. One bale landed in the main downtown intersection in Alice, Texas, and ranchers were joking about feeding the stuff to their livestock (a different kind of loco weed?).
Kimberlin wound up pleading guilty. He got 4 years.
But getting busted for smuggling dope was the least of Brett Kimberlin’s problems in the late ’70s and early ’80s. We’ll consider another of his legal difficulties in a later post.
Stay tuned.
Is This Their Legal Precedent?
Well, when the President does it, that means that it is not illegal.
—Richard Nixon
Not only is DoJ its up to ass in alligators with the ATF and Fast and Furious, now things are catching up to the DEA on laundering drug money. See here. And it’s not just the conservative blogosphere taking note. The NYT is on the case too.
UPDATE–Among the many laws and regulations violated by Operation Fast and Furious were the International Traffic in Arms Regulations overseen by the State Department, but apparently the State Department didn’t really care. DoS has been licensing legal shipments to Mexico knowing full well that substantial quantities of weapons were being diverted to the drug cartels.
Deeper Levels of Incompetence
Bob Owens has a new post at PJ Media on the latest twist in the competing stories about the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. He reports that the previous stories of an accidental encounter may be wrong. It may be that the gunmen were waiting to ambush a rival drug shipment based on information leaked to them by an FBI informant. Both the FBI and the DEA were aware of what was going down, but neither of these DoJ agencies warned the Border Patrol (which is part of Homeland Security). The Border Patrol unit walked into the ambush site armed with less-than-lethal weapons and their handguns. The drug gang had rifles.
Brian Terry’s murder was entirely preventable. The incompetence of the DEA and FBI let his Border Patrol unit walk into an ambush. After the ambush, it appears the FBI tampered with evidence to cover up that one of their informants was involved with the murder of a federal agent.
The government has recently sealed the case against the only suspect the FBI chose to keep behind bars.
Read the whole thing.
UPDATE—Meanwhile, back inside the Beltway, Media Matters thinks that the conservative disinformation machine is picking on our long-suffering Attorney General. Tina Korbe has a summary here.