retired agency officials say
BLM made serious mistake with show of force at Nevada standoff, retired agency officials say
Updated 6:04 AM; Posted Jan 14,
BLM made serious mistake with show of force at Nevada standoff, retired agency officials say | OregonLive.com
By Maxine Bernstein
mbernstein@oregonian.com
The Oregonian/OregonLive
Cliven Bundy and his two sons have repeatedly denounced the massive buildup of armed tactical officers, surreptitious surveillance and use of stun guns and police dogs near the family's Nevada ranch in the days leading up to the 2014 federal roundup of their cattle.
Now two retired high-level managers with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management are condemning their agency's militarized show of force during that operation.
Their criticism underscores deep divisions over how the government handled the case from the beginning all the way up to last week's remarkable dismissal of federal charges against the Bundys.
Two members of Congress have seized on the collapse of the prosecution, directing the Bureau of Land Management to respond to their concerns about "systemic issues" within the agency's law enforcement operations and its handling of the Bundy case by a Jan. 24 deadline.
The presence of more than 100 federal law enforcement officers was a highly unusual tactic to corral cattle. Many dressed in camouflage and carried rifles. Some took up sniper positions at observation posts near the Bundy ranch.
"It was a strategy that certainly was a poor one,'' said Robert Abbey, who served 30 years with the bureau, including eight years as its Nevada state director and then his final three years as national director through 2012. "In hindsight, the agency knew or should have known better.''
Land resource managers or range conservationists traditionally run the roundups of trespassing cattle in eastern Oregon or Nevada with the help of local sheriff's deputies, said Abbey and Mike Ford, who retired in 1999 as the land bureau's Nevada deputy director.
"It was never a law enforcement action in the BLM I grew up in,'' said Ford, who worked in the agency for 25 years. "For whatever reason, the BLM elected to turn this Bundy situation into a 100 percent law enforcement operation. That in my opinion was a grievous error. This entire operation was handled poorly from the beginning.''
Compounding the tension was the decision to have the bureau's special agent in charge of the Nevada and Utah region's law enforcement, lead the effort. Dan Love was considered a loose cannon, court and federal investigative records indicate, and escalated the confrontation. He has since been fired for unrelated misconduct.
At the same time, U.S. Reps. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, chair of the House Committee on Natural Resources, and Bruce Westerman, R-Arkansas, chair of its oversight and investigations subcommittee, are seeking a congressional review of the BLM's actions in the Bundy case.
"The failure of prosecutors to achieve a conviction in the Bundy case raises questions about the conduct of BLM law enforcement, and their ability to carry out effective, fair and professional law enforcement investigations,'' they said in a letter to the agency.
The U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Professional Responsibility also is investigating the prosecutors' evidence violations and whether discipline is warranted. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has sent an expert to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Nevada office to do a policy review and suggest what steps to take next to make sure prosecutors know the law requiring them to share evidence that may be favorable to the defense.
