14 November 2014

Oop is, yet again, a Secret Service term


Eliana Dockterman has a Time article about the latest clusterfuck by the Secret Service:
An intruder was able to climb the White House fence and enter the premises in September of 2014 because of a number of mishaps, like faulty alarm systems and officers not even spotting him, according to a summary of a Homeland Security report.
Members of Congress were briefed on the report, according to The New York Times, which obtained its executive summary. The report is said to detail the security lapses that allowed Omar Gonzalez, who is charged in the 19 September 2014 breach, to enter the White House. Among them, an officer who was stationed with an attack dog on the North Lawn was busy talking on a personal cell phone in a van and had not seen the man climb the fence.
Julia Pierson, who was the director of the Secret Service at the time of the incident, later resigned.
The New York Times has more in an article by Michael Schmidt:
An intruder was able to climb a fence and enter the White House in September of 2014 because of a succession of “performance, organizational, technical” and other failures by the Secret Service, according to a damning review of the incident by the Department of Homeland Security.
The review found that the Secret Service’s alarm systems and radios failed to function properly, and that many of the responding officers did not see the intruder as he climbed over the fence, delaying their response.
Omar Gonzalez, the man charged in the incident, could have been stopped by a Secret Service officer who was stationed on the North Lawn with an attack dog, the review said. But the officer did not realize that an intruder had made it over the fence because he was sitting in his van talking on his personal cellphone. The officer did not have his radio earpiece in, and had left the second radio he was supposed to have in his locker. It was only after he saw another officer running toward Gonzalez that he was alerted to the security breach. At that point, the officer gave the dog the command to attack, but the dog had not had a chance to “lock onto” the intruder “and may not have seen” him at all, according to the review. Gonzalez continued into the White House.
The review has not been made public, but members of Congress were briefed on it. An executive summary was obtained by The New York Times. The review of the 19 September 2014 breach is part of a much broader investigation of the Secret Service being conducted by the deputy secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas. That investigation is focused on other incidents in which the White House fence was scaled and how security at the White House could be improved. Julia Pierson, the director of the Secret Service, resigned after the September incident as well as other security lapses by the agency.
In addition to faulting the Secret Service for its handling of the security breach, the review also found that the agency mishandled its investigation of Gonzalez in the months before he succeeded in entering the White House. He first came to the attention of the authorities in July of 2014, when he was arrested on gun charges in Virginia. A month later, he was stopped outside the White House carrying a hatchet, but was not arrested.
The report also said that, because of staffing shortages, the uniformed Secret Service officers who were responsible for protecting the White House did not receive adequate training. But the bulk of the report focuses on what happened on the evening of 19 September 2014 from the time officers recognized Gonzalez outside the White House.
Gonzalez did not appear to show any odd behavior, so the officers did not talk to him or alert their supervisors. An hour later, at 7:19 pm, officers on Pennsylvania Avenue spotted him climbing over the fence at a point where one of the ornamental spikes was missing. The officers ran toward him and told him to stop, but he continued over the fence onto the North Lawn. One officer called over his radio that someone had gone over the fence, and an alarm was sounded. Two officers approached Gonzalez with their firearms pointed at him and told him to stop. He continued running, and the officers decided not to use lethal force because they did not believe he was armed.
One of the officers followed Gonzalez into the bushes in front of the North Portico but lost sight of him.
The summary said that the officers “were surprised that Gonzalez was able to get through the bushes” because “prior to that evening, the officers believed the bushes” were too thick to pass through. It was at that time that the officer with the dog joined the pursuit.
An officer stationed nearby was unable to see what was occurring because his view was obstructed by trees and bushes. That officer “was unable to hear any comprehensible radio communications about alarm breaks or Gonzalez” until he had gotten close to the North Portico entrance. “By the time the officer exited his vehicle and began yelling commands at Gonzalez, Gonzalez had nearly arrived at the bushes,” according to the summary. “The officer was unable to reach Gonzalez before he entered the bushes and, as a result, went around the bushes toward the North Portico, only to find that Gonzalez had already entered the White House.”
An officer stationed at the North Portico door could not hear on the radio what was occurring and had an obstructed view. Instead of remaining at the door, the officer took out his weapon and took cover behind a pillar. The officer put his finger on the trigger of his gun, pointed it at Gonzalez as he came up the stairs, and told him to stop. But, Gonzalez continued running, and the officer did not shoot because he did not believe Gonzalez was armed. It was later discovered that Gonzalez had a knife.
The wooden doors at the North Portico were closed and the officer assumed they were locked. “Believing that Gonzalez was trapped, and concerned that the canine might erroneously lock onto him, the officer chose to remain in place and out of the way” of the other officers who were chasing after him.
But the doors were not locked, and Gonzalez entered the White House. The emergency communication system by the entrance had been muted. As the officer stationed there tried to lock the doors, Gonzalez “barged through them and knocked her backward.” She told him to stop, but he continued on to the East Room.
“After attempting twice to physically take Gonzalez down but failing to do so because of the size disparity between the two, the officer then attempted to draw her baton, but accidentally grabbed her flashlight instead,” the report said. “The officer threw down her flashlight, drew her firearm, and continued to give Gonzalez commands that he ignored.”
Gonzalez entered the East Room, but then exited, heading down the hallway. Two officers stationed in the White House, assisted by two plainclothes agents who had just finished their shifts, tackled him.
Outside the White House, several officers, who said they did not know the layout of the building, were lining up in a tactical formation. “By the time they entered,” the report said, “Gonzalez had already been subdued”.
A copy of the findings was given to the acting Secret Service director, Joseph Clancy, at the end of last month so he “could immediately begin to take any additional security measures that the findings warranted in order to better ensure the White House complex is secure,” according to a statement from the Department of Homeland Security. But no Secret Service agents or officers have been disciplined in connection with the incident.
Rico says lessee, the wacko shows up outside the fence, finds a place where it's broken, climbs it, avoids agents who're on their personal phones and the dog, opens an unlocked door, pushes a female agent who can't tell the difference between her baton and her flashlight, and is finally taken down by two on-duty and two off-duty agents... Has he got this clusterfuck right? (Let's hope that somebody who really wants to kill the President doesn't show up.)

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