Pardons are in order for Border Patrol Agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean. There is no other option that is fitting for these two men. It is an absolute travesty of justice that these two men were even charged with a crime while carrying out their duties to protect America from drug smugglers and other undesirables.
If President Bush doesn’t pardon them, any respect I had for him, will be gone.
I Beg Your Pardon, Mr. President
During his tenure as President of the United States, George W. Bush has been stingier with his constitutional authority to grant pardons than any chief executive since World War II.
As of November 24, with just under two months left in office, out of the thousands of people pleading for pardons, the president had only found 171 worthy of his mercy.
But it is not the number of pardons that should concern the American people. It is who gets these pardons and who does not. Many presidents have been criticized for controversial pardons. Abraham Lincoln pardoned a man who had been convicted of attempted bestiality because he found the man’s character to be “otherwise reputable.”
Bush Fails To Pardon Border Agents
Wed, 11/26/2008 – 15:56 — Judicial Watch Blog
A rapper serving a lengthy prison sentence for smuggling cocaine, an embezzler and a tax evader are among those thankful for presidential pardons and commutations this week while a pair of U.S. Border Patrol agents spend another Thanksgiving in prison for intercepting an illegal immigrant drug smuggler.
Once again President George W. Bush has pardoned or reduced the sentences of serious criminals while the veteran federal agents— Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean—rot in jail for doing their job. The men intercepted a van loaded with drugs while guarding the Mexican border near El Paso in 2005. The admitted drug smuggler, an illegal alien named Osvaldo Aldrete-Davila, tried to flee and one of the agents shot him in the buttocks though he still got away.
Ramos and Compean were subsequently convicted on charges of causing serious bodily injury, assault with a deadly weapon, discharge of a firearm and violating the drug smuggler’s civil rights. The agents were sentenced to 11 and 12-year prison terms, outraging dozens of lawmakers from both parties who have pushed for pardons.
