By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
Was a Border Patrol agent killed or did he fall? What about his partner, who is in critical condition at a hospital?
The FBI is investigating what happened to the agents on a treacherous stretch of west Texas late Saturday night.
“There are a number of possible scenarios, but right now we are going to pursue it as an assault on a federal agent,” FBI Special Agent in Charge Emmerson Buie Jr. said during a Tuesday briefing in El Paso, the Los Angeles Times reports. “This is the most important investigation in the El Paso division of the FBI. We will be aggressively investigating all leads.”
Here’s what the FBI knows: Angelo Rogelio “Roger” Martinez, who was responding to a triggered sensor, was found with “traumatic head injuries” and broken bones. He died early Sunday from head injuries.
His partner, who has not been identified, also was found with head injuries. As of Tuesday evening, he was in critical but stable condition.
The union representing Border Patrol officers insist they were attacked with rocks.
“There’s no way he fell,” Chris Cabrera, a union spokesman and veteran agent based in McAllen, Texas, said of the agent who died. “Border Patrol agents are like mountain goats. They don’t fall. Especially two at the same spot.”
The FBI isn’t so sure. The agents were found at the bottom of a 9-foot-deep culvert in a treacherous area.
The death is still be investigated as a homicide.
