PROBE FINDS CIA VIOLATED PROCEDURES, COVERED UP FAILINGS AFTER
DOWNING PLANE CARRYING WEST MICHIGAN MISSIONARIES IN PERU

A new probe of the 2001 downing of a plane carrying West Michigan
missionaries in Peru concludes the CIA routinely violated intercept
procedures and covered up evidence of its failings.

U.S. Rep. Pete Hoekstra said he will press for renewed criminal
investigation into the incident and demand a hearing before the U.S.
House Intelligence Committee.

"We cannot have a community that operates outside the law and covers
up what it does and lies to Congress. This is a shootdown that should
not have occurred if we had an agency that was working
appropriately," said Hoekstra, R-Holland.

Veronica "Roni" Bowers, 35, of Muskegon, was holding her 7-month-old
daughter, Charity, when their plane was misidentified as a potential
drug-smuggling aircraft and fired upon by a Peruvian air force jet. A
bullet struck Bowers in the back, killing her and the baby.

Bowers' husband, Jim, then 37, son, Cory, 8, and the pilot survived
the crash that followed the shooting.

The shoot-down was part of a CIA-managed drug interdiction scheme
begun in 1990s that resulted in numerous other aircraft being shot
down by armed Peruvian planes. But according to the report by the
Office of Inspector General, that program routinely violated
intercept procedures.

Hoekstra said about 10 planes were shot down before the Bowers'
aircraft, in consistent violation of safety procedures that would
have averted the incident.

"The result was that ... suspect aircraft were shot down within two
to three minutes of being sighted by the Peruvian fighter -- without
being properly identified, without being given the required warnings
to land and without being given time to respond to such warnings as
were being given," the report stated.

The report said the CIA "did not fulfill its legal obligations" in
keeping Congress and the National Security Council informed of its activities.

It further stated that "in seeking to avoid criminal charges" and
civil liability, CIA legal advisers "advised agency managers to avoid
written products lest they be subject to legal scrutiny."

Veronica Bowers' mother, Florida resident Gloria Luttig, 70, said the
report only deepens the family's determination to find the truth.

"There has been nobody held accountable," Luttig said.

"My child was murdered. My granddaughter was murdered. To have nobody
held accountable is wrong. It's just been a nightmare the last seven years.

"I'm a Christian but I think somebody has to pay for this. An eye for
an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," Luttig said.

In 2002, Congress approved an $8 million payment to settle survivors'
claims stemming from the incident. Previous investigations have
failed to convince family members they were being told the entire story.

"Some of the members of the CIA have been promoted since then,"
Luttig said. "I want it out in the open, and I want it out in the
open now. It's just been one farce after another."

In 2005, after a three-year investigation, federal prosecutors ended
a criminal inquiry into whether at least four Central Intelligence
Agency officers lied to lawmakers and their agency superiors in the
clandestine antidrug operation.

The conduct under scrutiny was part of a CIA operation that was
authorized by President Bill Clinton beginning in 1994 to help the
Peruvian air force prevent drug flights over the country.

Officials said that investigation had not been directly related to
the act of shooting down the plane, which was misidentified as a
potential drug smuggling aircraft by a CIA surveillance plane
operated by a contract crew.

A U.S. and Peruvian inquiry in 2001 found the shooting was the result
of language problems, poor communications and shortcuts in following
procedures.