According to Pavlich, Newell was sanctioned for
his failures by the Office of the Inspector General:
Additionally, in response to the ATF/FBI interview,
despite all the evidence the death threats were
credible, Special Agent in Charge of the Los Angeles
Field Division John Torres, who like Newell has also
been promoted into ATF headquarters, informed
Dobyns through an email, The Chief of Operations
Security does not deem the emergency action is
required as of this date and time.
Later, a DOJ Inspector General report concluded
that management within the ATF Phoenix office,
despite having the necessary resources, did not
adequately address threats made against Dobyns
and found absence of any corrective measures
proposed to address the failure to conduct timely
and thorough investigations into the death threats
made against Dobyns.
In addition, a U.S. Office of Special Counsel report
concluded, I note with concern the absence of any
corrective measures proposed to address the failure
to conduct timely and thorough investigations into
the death threats made against Special Agent Dobyns.
ATF does not appear to have held anyone accountable
in this regard. Fully addressing the problems and failures
identified in this care requires more than amending ATF
policies and procedures. It requires that threats against
ATF agents be taken seriously and pursued aggressively
and that ATF officials at all level cooperate to ensure
the timely and comprehensive investigation of threats
leveled against its own agents.
Well, Dobyns house was then set on fire.
And ATF has named him as a suspect:
On top of ignoring death threats, recently Dobyns
house was set on fire at 3 a.m. with his wife, son
and daughter sleeping inside in a confirmed act of
arson. It is suspected members of the Hells Angels,
or close associates of the gang carried out the arson
in retaliation of Dobyns undercover work.
When Dobyns reported the incident to both ATF and
Newell, he asked for an investigation into the case.
Newell not only refused to investigate, calling the
incident just scorching, but allowed his subordinates,
including Gillett, to attempt to frame Dobyns, accusing
him of purposely burning down his own home with his
family inside, has named him as a suspect and is
investigating him. Newell conspired to destroy and
fabricate evidence to prove his case. Emails, witness
testimony, phone conversations and other
documentation show the ATF Phoenix Field Divisions
intentions, led by Newell, were to frame Dobyns, yet
Newell denied under oath any involvement in this
activity. His subordinates Gillett and ATF Tucson
Group Supervisor over Operation Wide Receiver Charles
Higman, also denied any attempts to frame Dobyns
under oath, despite evidence showing otherwise.
According to ATF Special Agent Vince Cefalu who
has been the target of retaliation by ATF bosses
himself this is part of a pattern of behavior by ATF
upper management:
These are just deplorable actions. Its just nauseating;
the familys been through enough.
Cefalu said the response was lackluster at best:
I was there three days after the fire, there wasnt
an ATF agent within a hundred
miles.
Cefalu was understandably incensed by the attempt to
paint a decorated agent as an arsonist. Cefalu noted
that had it been an FBI agent or DEA agent whose home
had been burned, federal agents would have descended
in droves.
Instead, he noted, the investigation was botched from
the beginning. Cefalu said a neighbor saw a glow that
might have been a cell phone in the backyard of Dobyns
house, and agents tried back-channel to get the U.S.
Marshals Service to ping the cellphone towers to try to
find out who might have had an active phone in the
area at the time of the fire to no avail.
In addition, protocol would have made the investigation
a federal matter, since it involved a federal agent
who received death threats pertaining to some
of his cases. Thats not what initially happened:
We [ATF] are the arson police, thats what we do.
But instead of ATF leading the investigation, the Pima
County Sheriffs Department took the lead. Additionally,
any information that Dobyns was a suspect should have
been turned over to the FBI within 24 hours, as should
any evidence ATF collected based on the death threats
Dobyns had received. Instead, according to Cefalu, ATF
waited 30 days:
Our policy is information has to be turned over to
FBI within 24 hours.
ATF sat on it for a month.
Nobody did nothing.
At this point, who burned down Dobyns house will
probably never be known, according to Cefalu:
All the physical evidence has been tainted, he said,
adding FBI never reduced interviews to writing, so
theres nothing even to go back to check against
should fresh evidence or suspects be uncovered.
FBI did a lackluster job.
According to Pavlich, this is par for the course where
retaliation in the ATF is concerned:
Throughout the years it has become clear that ATF is
more interested in protecting and promoting the corrupt
practices of the men who have made careers profiting
off of corruption, obstruction of justice and lies, like
Newell, rather than rewarding field agents taking out
dangerous criminals like ATF Special Agent Jay Dobyns,
ATF Operation Fast and Furious Whistleblowers John
Dodson, Pete Forcelli, Vince Cefalu and others for their
bravery and sacrifice to fight violent crime and for
exposing corruption within the agency.
The bottom line is, ATF as an agency doesnt care
about recommendations or evidence of misconduct,
in fact, the agency rewards screw ups on a regular
basis. The Dobyns case could be counted as the most
reckless case of retaliation in ATF history, yet nobody
has been held accountable for it.
