Secret Service Agent Shoots Car

Source: ABC News Blotter

The U.S. Secret Service is investigating why one of its agents shot his car last month during a United Nations visit by the Iranian premier.

Secret Service spokesman Eric Zahren confirmed that his agency's internal affairs unit has been asked to find out the details surrounding an agent's "accidental discharge" into the floorboard of his vehicle on Sept. 25 in Manhattan.

The spokesman would not confirm the type of gun used to shoot the automobile. The car was parked in a "staging area," Zahren said. He noted that there were no "principles" near the site of the shooting -- security-speak for the individuals under Secret Service protection.

Zahren would not identify who the agent was assigned to protect, although two security officials familiar with the incident tell ABC News the agent was protecting Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.


Read more: http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2007/10/secret-service-.html

Are they so short handed now that Cheney has to double as a SS agent??

:rofl:

so Bush was right there?

Is it illiteracy, or is it a bit of truth leaking out?

Remember this one?

http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2007/04/two_guards_woun.html

I wonder if it's the same guy?

He was carrying a carbine-type weapon, like an HK MP5 or an M4, was getting out of the car and did not have the safety on or whacked it into battery.

We had something like this occur during a bank robbery here in NJ. One FBI agent died from his wounds.

Excessive force, I'd say.

Shooting it was the agent's only option.

:rofl:

:spank:

Was it a foreign car? You know you can't trust them foreign cars.

was good enough for Basil Faulty.

lol

about shooting my TV.

Should I apply for a job with the Secret Service?

negligent discharge. Had that pounded into my brain.

That being said some fully automatic issue weapons lack safety features present on civ weapons. One such safety is a mechanism that prevents the firing pin from moving forward when the bolt is released while putting the weapon into battery.

M16's can do this and I have seen a dimpled round (cap is dented) after ejecting a round. This CAN cause the weapon to fire, never seen it, heard of it.

However locking and loading a weapon in a vehicle was a no no for this reason. Maybe they have different rules.

If it was a sidearm there is no excuse.

Like blaming the Iranians for this?

from that old Saturday morning cartoon.

Could somebody shoot my van? I think the transmission's shot.

It was deer season, if I remember, and he as unloading his hunting rifle when it went off, just before he was to re-enter the truck. He had the rifle pointing downward in a safe location (The lower front fender of his truck) and it went off. No damage to the truck (or anyone else do to where the weapon was pointed) except for a nice hole, but something he talked about for years afterward. The truck NEVER caused him any problem afterward, it learned its lesson.

My point is accidentally firing of weapons do happen, the key is to make sure the operator had the weapon pointed in a safe location AND it was not do to any unsafe operation by the officer. Int he case I mentioned above, no problem. The officer had been on his own land and it went off into his own truck. No damage to anyone else or any other property. He had the weapon pointed in a safe location, it just went off (Weapons do do that). The issue regarding this Secret Service Operator is WHY did the pistol go off? Is it do to faulty ammunition (i.e. primer to sensitive that a light vibration would set it off, making such ammunition unsafe in ANY weapon) or faulty handling (Them re-training is in order) or maybe for no reason that could be foresee (i.e. it just went off). Lets see that the investigation uncover.

P.S. one of the theories behind the Kennedy assassination is that Oswald only injured the President, but the Secret Service around the President rush to the Car to protect the President and one of the Secret Agents accidentally fired his gun into the President. The post-assassination investigation (from what I have heard) did NOT look at the Secret Service Weapons to see of one of them may have been fired, thus it is possible, but probably did NOT happen. The reason is most investigation looks into ALL Weapons around the Area (Including any police and the Agents) and do to this possibility any agent who gun went off would have reported such a accident just to protect himself (i.e. better to report it first then it be found out later). It is an intriguing theory on Kennedy's assassination and the massive head wound Kennedy suffered from do to the assassination but probably did not happen, but here we have an Secret Service Agent who did accidentally fire his weapon inside a car.