Customs Service guns, computers missing
WASHINGTON (AP) – More than 2,000 computers and 72 weapons have been lost or stolen from the U.S. Customs Service over the last three years, Sen. Chuck Grassley said Thursday as he prodded the agency to fix the problem quickly. The information comes from an audit by the Treasury Department’s inspector general. Grassley, the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, had requested the audit that was completed Monday, and he released a heavily edited copy of the IG’s report Thursday.
The report comes as the customs service – the nation’s oldest law enforcement agency, founded in 1789 – has shifted its primary mission from detecting smuggled narcotics to preventing terrorists, possibly with nuclear, chemical or biological weapons, from getting into the country. The change was prompted by the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
The sensitive items lost or stolen from 1999 through 2001 from Customs, a Treasury Department agency, included:
– 2,251 computers (1,713 desktops and 538 laptops), valued at $690,000.
– 72 firearms, although 13 were subsequently recovered, leaving 59 unaccounted for that were valued at $18,560. One recovered weapon had been used in a gang-related drive-by shooting, the report said.
– 613 badges, which would cost $12,260 to replace.
Customs has more than 19,000 employees worldwide and oversees roughly 301 points of entry into the United States, including seaports, airports and border crossings on land. As of fiscal year 2001, customs reported owning 39,799 computers, and 29,106 firearms.
“Each of these items poses a threat to national security, public safety or ongoing investigations, if lost or stolen,” the report said.
Importantly, the report said customs did have controls in place that limited access to computer files and its computer network. “Those controls decreased the risk that classified or sensitive data would be compromised if a computer were lost or stolen,” the report said.
Customs had no immediate comment.
On a positive note, no ammunition was reported stolen or lost over those three years.
The report said customs had written procedures in place for managing and safeguarding such sensitive property, and the agency required reporting of all lost or stolen items.
“However we noted that policies and procedures were sometimes not followed or not completed properly,” the report said.
“Most significantly, an annual independent physical inventory had not been completed for some sensitive property items,” the report said. That increased the risk that lost or stolen items would not be detected quickly, it said.
To address the problem, the report said customs this year will begin annual inventories of its computers and will take steps to keep better track of badges and credentials.
Grassley, of Iowa, wrote to Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill on Thursday, criticizing the department for not releasing the inspector general’s report publicly
“It’s not right to keep a lid on information just because it’s embarrassing to the agency,” Grassley told O’Neill. “If customs has trouble with inventory, it needs to face the problem and fix it.” Grassley’s office said it received a copy of the report – with certain information blacked out – after sending the letter.