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Hearing called to address flawed stings exposed by Journal Sentinel investigation
A Journal Sentinel investigation uncovered mistakes and failures in an undercover sting in Milwaukee's Riverwest neighborhood by the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives – stolen guns, sensitive documents lost, wrong people charged and a burglary of the sting storefront.
Washington — After running nearly 40 undercover storefront stings in the last five years, the ATF's deputy director says no such operations are now underway and improvements in oversight have been made in the wake of botched operations nationwide.
Deputy Director Thomas E. Brandon testified Thursday before the House Judiciary's Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, and Investigations, and acknowledged significant deficiencies in undercover storefront stings. He said there was no justification for having the wrong people charged, as happened in Milwaukee, or the lack of outside cover teams to ensure armed felons didn't leave.
He called locating an undercover gun-buying operation in Portland, Ore., across the street from a middle school "a mistake" and said it "wasn't great judgment" for agents there to pay two teens to get tattoos depicting the fake storefront's logo of a giant squid smoking a joint.
He said the young men requested the tattoos and agents tried to talk them out of it — testimony that conflicts with the account of events described in court by the prosecuting attorney.
Brandon also told members of the subcommittee, which is chaired by U.S. Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.), that undercover storefront stings remain a "valuable investigative technique" when managed properly. He said the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives recently created a manual for how to properly run undercover storefronts — the first of its kind — and will be training agents on proper methods.
He said the ATF has conducted 37 undercover storefront operations since 2009. He called them "resource intensive" but did not disclose how much they cost. Most of the troubled stings took place before B. Todd Jones became head of the agency, he said.
Jones was appointed as acting director of the ATF in August 2011, while he worked simultaneously as U.S. attorney for the District of Minnesota. He was confirmed by the Senate as director of the ATF in July 2013.
Thursday's hearing was one of two planned on flawed storefront operations nationwide uncovered by a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel investigation.
In his opening remarks, Sensenbrenner called the Milwaukee sting an "abysmal failure."
"To say that the operation was extremely flawed would be a vast understatement," he said.
"This doesn't appear to be one operation gone bad but a systemic problem plaguing the ATF," he added. "After Operation Fast and Furious we were told numerous times that changes were coming to the ATF under the new leadership. I certainly hope this operation and others like it are not indicative of those changes because they aren't changes for the better, at all."
And, Sensenbrenner noted, the Milwaukee operation began several months after Jones became acting director of the agency.
He also criticized the ATF for not disclosing the troubles to members of Congress who oversee the agency.
"I'd like to know why I found out about this from my hometown newspaper," he said.
Brandon apologized and said he, too, learned of many of the problems from the Journal Sentinel stories.
The Journal Sentinel found the agency used mentally disabled people to promote operations and then arrested them on drug and gun charges; opened storefronts close to schools and churches, boosting their arrest numbers and penalties; and attracted juveniles with free video games and alcohol.
Agents paid inflated prices for guns, which led to people buying weapons at stores and selling them to undercover agents hours later, in some cases for nearly three times what they paid. In addition, agents allowed armed felons to leave their fake stores and openly bought stolen goods, spurring burglaries in surrounding neighborhoods.
Brandon told members of the subcommittee the agency has since developed methods to spot "trends" and track whether guns are coming from stores and has drafted policies on outside cover teams.
He said the ATF did not target people with mental disabilities.
U.S. Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, wondered "whether these operations attracted more crime than they prevented," asking Brandon if he considered a ratio of one-in-six flawed operations to be "successful" — considering the Journal Sentinel found troubles in all of the half-dozen stings it deeply investigated. Goodlatte sought assurance from Brandon that there aren't others marred with similar foul-ups.
Brandon responded, "With the information I have right now, I would say that." He added the Department of Justice inspector general is looking at the issue.
U.S. Rep. Robert Scott (D-Va.) criticized the agency for its lack of oversight of undercover storefronts, calling the failures "embarrassing and at times dangerous to public safety." Scott aimed many of his questions at whether agency officials believe they have adequate gun laws.
Nobody on the subcommittee addressed the issue of accountability or if any agents involved in foul-ups had been punished.
The ATF is facing increasingly intense scrutiny for the operations from members of both parties in Congress and the U.S. Department of Justice.
Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz announced last week he is investigating ATF storefront stings in four cities — Milwaukee; Wichita, Kan.; Pensacola, Fla.; and St Louis — to see if the operations put the public at risk. U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) called for the investigation, calling the ATF tactics "totally inexcusable."
In Milwaukee, the operation's lead undercover agent had three of his guns, including a machine gun, stolen from his car. The machine gun remains missing. Milwaukee police disclosed this week that a second ATF gun, a 9mm handgun stolen from the agent's car, also has not been recovered.
The agency launched an internal investigation into the Milwaukee sting that confirmed the findings of the Journal Sentinel report. But in a briefing with congressional staffers, ATF officials "were adamant" that the problems in the Milwaukee case were isolated.
The Journal Sentinel later exposed similar problems in stings from Pensacola, Fla., to Portland, Ore.
Through a dozen federal Freedom of Information Act requests, the Journal Sentinel asked the agency for information such as how much the operations cost, how many stings have been run nationwide and what the rules are for agents keeping guns in cars.
In denying release of information about gun storage rules, the agency said releasing such information would make "every agent a potential armed robbery victim."
This week, the agency released reports on ATF guns that were lost or stolen in the past five years, revealing that agents' guns were left under car seats, in bathroom stalls, on an airplane and on the top of vehicles.
