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INS' serial killer suspect handling to be investigated
By STEVE LASH
c.1999 Houston Chronicle
WASHINGTON - The Justice Department will investigate the
Immigration and Naturalization Service's handling of suspected
serial killer Rafael Resendez-Ramirez,
who was released by the agency in early June even though he was
wanted in a Texas slaying, officials said Wednesday.
INS Commissioner Doris Meissner, under fire over the matter, said she requested the investigation by the department, of which the INS is a part. The agency's internal auditors will help the Justice Department's inspector general review procedures and identification systems, she said.
INS had Resendez-Ramirez in custody June 2 near El Paso but allowed the illegal immigrant to return to Mexico after a check by the agency's $65 million identification system failed to turn up his long criminal record or three past deportations. He is now sought in at least eight slayings, five in Texas. Meissner's request followed a vitriolic attack Wednesday on her agency's handling of the case by Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio and chairman of the House panel that oversees INS.
Smith blamed federal incompetence or apathy for the suspected serial killer's continued freedom and recent slayings, assailing INS as "one of the worst-run
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"We have an agency that is either incompetent or doesn't care," said Smith, who chairs the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims. "We have an agency in crisis." Since June 21, Resendez-Ramirez has been on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted Fugitives list, suspected in the deaths of five people in Texas and two in Jackson County, Ill. He also is a suspect in a 1997 slaying in Lexington, Ky.
He came to the attention of federal and Texas authorities Jan. 7 when he was named as a suspect in the slaying of Dr. Claudia Benton of West University Place, an enclave of Houston. Fingerprints in the woman's stolen Jeep Cherokee connected Resendez-Ramirez to the killing. A federal arrest warrant was issued May 27, the FBI's Houston office reported. But the warrant apparently did not come up during the INS check six days later.
Smith said President Clinton and Attorney General Janet Reno, whose Justice Department includes INS, should be held responsible for "mismanagement and endangering the lives of the American people." Smith pinned much of the blame for Resendez-Ramirez's release on INS's Automated Biometric Identification System, or IDENT, intended to enable the agency to access criminal records of illegal immigrants.
IDENT apparently failed to reveal Resendez-Ramirez's criminal record, said Smith, who added he no longer believes the claims of INS officials who had told Congress that the computer system was operational. "IDENT is faulty either because the Justice Department has terrible judgment or because the administration is not serious about arresting criminal aliens," said Smith. "Either way, it's the American people who suffer."
Smith also expressed mock surprise at the apparent failure of IDENT system in light of the Justice Department's successful application of the less-expensive, $37 million computer program that instantly checks the criminal records of would-be gun purchasers.
"The Clinton administration wants the FBI to check the background of every law-abiding sportsman buying a hunting rifle in the United States," Smith said. "Why can't it also make the INS and the FBI check the criminal records of anyone who is arrested after entering the United States illegally?
Resendez-Ramirez's rap sheet dates to August 1976 when he was arrested by INS agents at the Brownsville, Texas, port of entry and returned to Mexico. Since then, he has served about eight years in U.S. prisons for burglary, auto theft, aggravated assault, falsely claiming to be a U.S. citizen, illegal gun possession and fraudulently trying to obtain Social Security cards.
