REPORT ISSUED IN PLANE'S DOWNING

Lax Procedures Are Cited In Peru Shootdown

The scene taped by the infrared camera on the nose of the CIA aircraft is
soothingly calm. For nearly 45 minutes, a small plane moves through
billowing clouds over northern Peru, blissfully unaware it is being followed.

Inside the CIA cockpit, a voice recorder catches the low beat of pop music
and the English and Spanish radio conversations of two American pilots and
the Peruvian official aboard as they guide a Peruvian A37B toward the
suspected drug flight. But to each other, and in pidgin Spanish to the
Peruvian official, the Americans mention their rising doubts that the plane
contains a drug smuggler. Busy on his radio as the fighter closes in, the
Peruvian turns to them and says, "What?"

Suddenly a loud voice breaks into the tape, screaming, "Me estan matando!
Me estan matando!" They are killing me. They are killing me.

"No!" yells one of the CIA pilots to the Peruvian. "Don't shoot! No mas, no
mas."

The Peruvian, in turn, shouts into his radio to the fighter pilot. "Stop!
No mas! No mas!" No more.

The other CIA pilot expels a breath. "God," he murmurs.

The dramatic recording ends minutes later, as the small plane is seen
drifting toward the Amazon River below. The tape was released yesterday by
the State Department, along with a report from the joint U.S.-Peruvian
investigation into the mistaken April 20 shootdown of a plane carrying
American missionaries.

The report does not assign blame for the incident, which resulted in the
deaths of a missionary woman, Veronica "Roni" Bowers, and her infant
daughter, as well as the severe wounding of pilot Kevin Donaldson. But its
description of the program under which the United States helped Peru to
shoot down drug planes is of a tragedy waiting to happen.

When the program began in 1994, President Bill Clinton certified that Peru
had rigorous procedures to prevent the loss of innocent lives. But those
procedures "became less detailed and explicit" over the years, the report says.

According to Rand Beers, assistant secretary of state for international
narcotics and law enforcement affairs, who headed the investigation, the
original procedures were "abbreviated," both in joint training for the
missions and in subsequent written agreements. What began as a careful,
four-step process to identify and warn an aircraft before opening fire
became three rapid phases: "Radio. Warning. Use of deadly force."
Investigators, Beers said, "are not aware that anyone in Washington knew
that these were the phases and that they had been abbreviated."

Donaldson, the missionary pilot, had not turned on the VHF radio that the
Peruvian jet used in three warnings, all in the final 10 minutes of the
incident. Donaldson was using a separate, high-frequency radio to call his
wife in his home city of Iquitos, and to tell the Iquitos airport control
tower he would arrive soon. The CIA plane heard his screams over that radio.

Although the registration number of Donaldson's plane was clearly written
on its tail and on the fixed wing above the fuselage, it was not checked
before the shootdown.

The jet pilot made no attempt to fly in front of Donaldson and waggle his
wings, instructing him to land as prescribed by international aviation
accords. Flying behind, where Donaldson could not see him, he fired warning
shots above the missionary plane. But the fighter's nose was pointed toward
the sky, as the pilot tried to avoid stalling at Donaldson's slow speed, so
the missionaries never saw the shots passing above their plane.

Among the report's other conclusions:

Key U.S. and Peruvian participants "narrowly viewed their respective
command and control roles." Although the Americans raised questions in the
final minutes, they were "out of the line of [Peruvian] command" -- a
provision the United States had sought at the outset of the program so that
U.S. liability for mistakes would be limited.

The missionary plane was heading west into Peru, uncharacteristic of a drug
flight. But Donaldson's flight path along the meandering Amazon River, and
his failure to file a formal flight plan for the return portion of his trip
to the Colombia-Brazil border, were interpreted as suspect. Donaldson, with
years of flying experience in the area, maintained he was following
standard procedure. Beers pointedly noted that the report "did not conclude
that Mr. Donaldson was at fault."

"Language limitations of Peruvian and American participants" aboard the CIA
Cessna Citation V prevented them from communicating effectively with each
other.

"Communications systems overload" -- simultaneous conversations among the
Americans and their ground stations in Peru and Florida; among the Peruvian
official aboard the plane, his ground station and the jet fighter; and
among those on the CIA plane, as well as extraneous radio noise and music
in the cockpit -- also played a role in the tragedy.

The United States has credited the shootdown program with reducing drug
exports. But it suspended the program in Peru, as well as a similar effort
in Colombia, pending completion of the State Department investigation and a
separate policy review. Beers said yesterday that the policy review, by
former U.S. Ambassador Morris D. Busby, is complete. But he said he had no
information on whether, or when, the Bush administration would resume the
program.