Fast And Furious Involves FBI, IED's and White House

This blog has tried to stay abreast of the latest developments on Operation Gun Runner and its better know subplot Operation fast and Furious. There is much breaking news on Operation Fast and Furious and at the risk of omitting some details I'll try to cover them in a single post.

Congress expands Fast and Furious probe to include White House

Congressional investigators have formally asked the Obama administration to turn over copies of "all records" involving three key White House national security officials and the program, other ATF gun cases in Phoenix, and all communications between the White House and the ATF field office in Arizona. In an earlier post we showed video of ATF supervisor William Newell indicating that he had informed a Kevin O'Reilly, a White House NRC member of details of Operation Fast and Furious.



White House officials said they have been cooperating in the widening probe, begun earlier this year when several ATF whistle blowers alerted congress that Fast and Furious weapons were found at the scene of the slaying of a U.S. Border Patrol agent.

New allegations in 'Fast and Furious' scandal implicate the FBI

Probably owing to J. Edgar Hoover and the power that he wielded the FBI has been able to stay aloof from the sandals that have bedeviled past presidents and attorney generals. If the FBI is involved in Operation Fast and Furious one might expect it to cut its losses without considering the damage it may do Eric Holder and Barack Obama. This blog speculated early on that F&F had to have some cooperation from the FBI since an FBI background check was run on "straw buyers" when they purchased firearms and at least one of those buyers had a criminal record. Much was made that two F&F weapons were found at the scene of border agent Brian Perry's murder. Up until now it was not known that a third weapon was also recovered and the FBI has sat on that information.




The third weapon was put there by a member of  Sinaloa Cartel, an FBI informant and possibly the murderer.

Operation Fast and Furious let grenades, IEDs 'walk' into Mexico

Federal authorities are now investigating why the U.S. Attorney's office in Phoenix released Jean Baptiste Kingery after he confessed to providing military-style weapons to the now-defunct La Familia Michoacana drug cartel. Kingery must be a pretty good mechanic. He is reported to have made IED's (Improvised Explosive Devices) from grenade parts for the Sinaloa Cartel and also showed cartel members how to convert semi-automatic AK47's in full auto firing rifles. From Business Insider;

"Kingery, who was arrested and released in June 2010, confessed to manufacturing improvised explosive devices (IEDs) using grenade components from the U.S. He also admitted to helping the cartel convert semi-automatic rifles into machine guns. Mexican criminal organizations are increasingly using these military-style weapons as the cartels' escalate their wars against the government and one another. Despite Kingery's confession, and over loud protestations from the arresting ATF officers, the U.S. Attorney's office let Kingery go within hours of his arrest."

Second violent crime linked to ATF gunwalking

So far the murder of Brian Perry was the only know incident to involve Fast and Furious weapons but now a second incident comes to light in Arizona. In the second violent crime connected with the failed Fast and Furious program, two Arizona undercover police officers were allegedly assaulted last year trying to stop two men in a stolen vehicle containing two weapons linked to the program. More.

Summing up the latest news it's safe to assume that this case won't be going away any time soon.