The Department of Homeland Security says that thousands of badges and hundreds of firearms and cell phones have been lost or stolen over the past few years. As part of a Freedom of Information Act request, news outlet The Complete Colorado obtained DHS inventory reports showing that various federal agencies reported more than 1,300 badges and credentials, 165 firearms and 589 cell phones as being lost or stolen between October 2012 and April 2015.
"It's scary that you'd have that number of credentials out there that someone could manipulate," retired Secret Service special agent Tim Miller told FOX News.
DHS' Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported the most lost or stolen badges and firearms, while Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) also topped the list.
Thirty-one of the firearms were listed as lost, while all but two of the rest were reported as stolen. However, the DHS inspector general has previously said that the reported number of lost guns may be misleading because law enforcement often believe that reporting a stolen firearm is more acceptable than reporting a lost firearm.
A number of recent shootings have been committed with firearms stolen from law enforcement. In July, Kate Steinle was shot and killed in San Francisco by an illegal immigrant who used a gun issued to a Bureau of Land Management Law Enforcement Ranger. The gun used in September to kill Oakland muralist Antonio Ramos was stolen from an ICE agent, and in January, Edward Archer used a gun stolen from a police officer to shoot Philadelphia police officer Jesse Hartnett.
Former Homeland Security Undersecretary and FEMA Director Michael Brown says the missing credentials pose a great enough risk that it should be investigated by the inspector general.
"Law enforcement credentials, badges or ID cards can be used to access areas closed to the public, restricted access areas, and allow a person to pose as a law enforcement official where lax inspection of the credential to match it with the person carrying it allows that person entry to restricted areas," Brown said in a statement to CompleteColorado.com. "Possession of these kinds of credentials gives terrorists or criminals the basic information needed to counterfeit other credentials. For example, a terrorist cell could use these credentials or counterfeited credentials to access public events posing as law enforcement officials, bypassing security measures designed to detect explosives or other contraband."
