Assaults against Border Patrol agents dropped for the sixth year in a row in fiscal 2014, the Arizona Republic reports.
The agency recorded 373 assaults against agents, a 20% decline over 2013. Of those, 366 occurred along the Southwest border.
That represents a two-thirds drop since fiscal 2008.
Although CPB has broken down the types of assaults in the past, it hadn’t by the Republic’s deadline.
Despite the drop in attacks, agents still feel more vulnerable to attack.
“Agents out there are saying that the people we arrest are less likely to listen to verbal commands,” said Art Del Cueto, president of the Tucson local of the National Border Patrol Council, a union representing agents. “They tend to want to run more, to push back against the agent, to be verbally aggressive.”
