Debbie Schlussel: Sex With Minors, Homeland Security & The Terrorists
**** UPDATE: HOMELAND SECURITY'S FRANK FIGUEROA--FORMER ICE SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE & FORMER HEAD OF ICE'S OPERATION PREDATOR SEX CRIMES UNIT--PLEADS NO CONTEST TO EXPOSING HIMSELF. ****
News is buzzing about high-ranking Homeland Security official Brian J. Doyle's arrest on charges of using his computer to seduce a minor and transmission of harmful material (porn) to a minor, a cop posing as a 14-year-old girl.
There are a lot of lessons to be learned from this incident.
The scary thing is not just that he's so high up (he is DHS' Deputy Press Secretary). It's that he's one of a string of Homeland Security agents and high-ranking officials who have been caught in alleged sex crimes, some with minors.
We're lucky these people have been caught. But how many others have not been? They are extremely vulnerable to blackmail by terrorists or other criminals. Yet, some of those who've been caught remain in the employ of Homeland Security . . . as FEDERAL AGENTS!
In Doyle's case, he told the cop he thought was the 14-year-old girl that he worked for Homeland Security and gave her his name, office and government-issued cell numbers. He also sent her his photo. What if she was not a cop posing as a 14-year-old, but an Islamic terrorist looking to get sensitive information? We suggest that plot line to producer Joel Surnow for "24," next season.
Then there is the issue of Homeland Security and its claim that the Department is the premiere Department chasing child porn and its predators. A significant number of Homeland Security's new ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) Agents have been put on the sex beat, which includes pursuing online stuff like what Doyle did.
But it took sheriffs in Polk County, Florida, NOT a federal agency that should be pursuing terrorists and illegal aliens, to get this careless top Homeland Security official, Doyle.
Because of Customs laws, ICE, the immigration agency, is the Homeland Security agency that is involved in this area. Immigration and sex crimes against minors mix occasionally in terms of sex tourism, child sex slaves, and the old Customs-connected transmission or importation of sex material over international borders. The ICE agents who pursue these crimes do good work. But enforcing immigration laws and kiddie porn laws are two very different and disparate areas.
Then, there is the question about whether Homeland Security--or ICE--is really serious about pursuing sex crimes. A few weeks ago, we saw ICE chieftess Julie L. Myers a/k/a "The ICE Princess" in the national media asserting her worst soap opera-style dramatics to announce a big ICE bust of child porn users and purveyors.
But we found it hard to take her seriously. Why? Well, for starters, a federal agent under her employ, Frank Figueroa a/k/a "Frankie the Fig," remains under her employ, and probably will be after his upcoming April trial. He was not just any ICE agent. He was ICE's Special Agent in Charge of Tampa and former director of ICE's sex crimes unit, "Operation Predator." He exposed himself to a teenager in a mall (and had a prior arrest for the same thing and ICE officials knew about it). (UPDATE: Figueroa pleaded "No Contest," this morning.)
Yet, for all her professed commitment to pursuing child sex predators, ICE chieftess Julie Myers and her hand-picked Ethics Princess, Traci Lembke, refuse to fire him. And sources say, they will draw things out until July, when Figueroa will be completely vested in and fully eligible for his pension, well over $100,000 per year.
Besides Figueroa, there are the other ICE agents who remain employed. Among them:
* An alleged child molester working as an ICE Agent in Detroit for Michigan and Ohio ICE Special Agent in Charge Brian Moskowitz a/k/a "Abu Moskowitz";
* An ICE Agent caught soliciting a prostitute in his government-issued "G"-car (while drunk driving) working in Detroit, also for Abu Moskowitz; and
* An ICE Agent in Texas who allegedly helped handcuff a woman to a hot tub when the woman refused to perform a sex act on the agent and her cop boyfriend.
These are just a few instances that we know of. All of these individuals are currently on the taxpayer payroll. And all of them are vulnerable to blackmail.
Homeland Security? Nope. More like, Sex Criminals' Job Security. And more vulnerability to terrorists for our country.
Posted by Debbie on April 5, 2006 12:34 PM to Debbie Schlussel