GovernmentExecutive.com

An airline passenger who verbally and physically assaulted Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers was sentenced to 10 months in a federal prison and three years of supervised release.

According to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Nevada, Rodney Smith, also known as Tori Nickel Smith, refused to submit to a physical search by an ICE officer when he arrived at McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas on July 24, 2003, on an international flight from Mexico.

A Las Vegas resident, Smith, 33, pleaded guilty to the charge of interfering with security personnel and has been on bond since the day after the skirmish. He must surrender to the Federal Bureau of Prisons by Friday.

The incident began after Smith refused to be searched by ICE agents. He insulted ICE employees with foul language and was escorted to a private search area where he maintained his refusal to be searched.

Smith then "flailed his hands" and knocked a female officer into a wall resulting in scrapes and a three-inch cut on her arm. The officer had to seek medical attention.

With the help of several ICE employees, Smith was subdued, arrested and charged with assaulting and resisting federal officers.

The case was investigated by ICE agents and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Karyn Kenny.

Accused of Illegal Harboring

A Border Patrol agent assigned to the Naco, Ariz., station was arrested on a six-count indictment, including harboring an illegal immigrant for four years.

Pablo Sergio Berry, 23, is accused of allowing Claudia Veronica Vasquez-Banda to live with him from 2001 to Feb. 17, 2005.

Berry failed to list Vasquez-Banda, an illegal immigrant, on the National Security questionnaire he submitted June 24, 2002, when applying for a Border Patrol job, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Arizona.

He also told a background investigator in a letter that Vasquez-Banda was a U.S. citizen, when he knew she was not.

A resident of Douglas, Ariz., about 30 miles from Naco, Berry appeared before Magistrate Judge Bernardo P. Velasco in U.S. District Court in Tucson, Ariz., on June 22. Vasquez-Banda was held as a material witness, but no charges were filed against her.

Charged with harboring an illegal alien, three counts of making false statements and two counts of making false documents, Berry could receive a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

The investigation was conducted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Office of Professional Responsibility with assistance from the Border Patrol.