A new blistering review by the Department of Homeland Security released on Thursday found that a series of “performance, organizational, technical” and other types of failures allowed Omar Gonzalez to jump the White House fence and make it deep into the White House before being stopped.
The review was not made public but an executive summary was obtained by The New York Times.
The review said that Gonzalez could have easily been stopped by the Secret Service officer stationed with an attack dog at the North Lawn. The officer, however, missed Gonzalez after he jumped the fence because the officer was talking on his cell phone in a van. The officer also didn’t have his radio earpiece in and his backup radio had been left in his locker.
The officer was finally alerted about what was going on by another officer running after Gonzalez, according to the report. The dog was then given the order to attack but it was too late by then — the dog missed its window to “lock onto” Gonzalez, according to the review. So Gonzalez made it past that line of defense.
What’s worse, the new Homeland Security review also found that the Secret Service bungled its investigation of Gonzalez following his intrusion into the White House. It also said that officers at the White House were not adequately trained for the situation due to staffing shortages.
