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| thetruckersreport.com |
Story thanks to thetruckersreport.com Link provided below:
When Craig Patty hired a new driver to operate one of the two trucks in his burgeoning fleet, he never expected that the man he hired had anything less that the pristine background that he saw on the job application . He wouldn’t have imagined that a government agency had falsified thecriminal history report of his new employee so that they could use him as an informant. And he would never have believed that the DEA would refuse to offer him protection or pay for the damages after they used the informant in a botched sting operation that resulted in the destruction of his truck and death of his employee at the hands of the notorious Zetas drug cartel.
And yet, that’s exactly what happened.
The employee’s name was Lawrence Chapa and even though he had an extensive criminal record, the DEA wiped that clean so that he would be able to pass the background check that Patty ran when he was hired. They were planning on using him as part of an operation that would catch members of the Zetas drug trafficking crime syndicate. Patty was never informed that his driver was anything more than he appeared to be.
One day Chapas was supposedly taking the truck for repairs in Houston when he was in fact driving a truck full of marijuana to the border and back for the DEA. He was being escorted by officers wearing plain clothes who were ready to bust the drug traffickers when the drugs were delivered.
The sting went horribly wrong when the truck was ambushed in broad daylight by three vehicles who opened fire on the truck, killing Chapas and severely damaging the truck. Two law enforcement officers were injured and four suspects were taken into custody and charged with capital murder.
Patty knew nothing about any of this until he received a call that his driver had been murdered and that he would have to come remove his damaged vehicle at his own expense or pay storage charges. Patty received neither an apology from the DEA nor any money to pay for repairs of the vehicle. Furthermore, his insurance company refused to pay for the damages since the truck had been used for illegal activities. He paid to have the truck removed and repaired by taking money out of hisretirement plan .
Since his request for the DEA to pay for the damages was ignored, Patty is suing the DEA for up to $6.4 million. The price tag includes the cost of repairs, lost income from not being able to use the truck during the time it was damaged, and for emotional hardship. Patty and his family have been living in fear since the attack, worried that the Zetas cartel might mistakenly think that he had something to do with the operation and come to exact revenge.
According to an interview with the Houston Chronicle he and his family still jump at every noise, from deer on their yard to a car pulling in to the driveway.
“I’ve gone to great lengths to keep my son believing in Santa Claus,” Patty said. “And now I’m talking to him about death, mayhem and drug cartels.”
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