Customs check.The nation's first commissioner of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), a bureau of the United States Department of Homeland Security, is charged with regulating and facilitating international trade, collecting import duties, and enforcing U.S. trade laws. Agency, a division of the Department of Homeland Security Noun 1. Department of Homeland Security - the federal department that administers all matters relating to homeland security Homeland Security executive department - a federal department in the executive branch of the government of the United States , has re-joined Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP as a partner. Robert Bonner, a former U.S. attorney in Los Angeles who served as co-chairman of Gibson Dunn's business crimes and investigations practice group until 2001, will focus on internal investigations and civil litigation An action brought in court to enforce a particular right. The act or process of bringing a lawsuit in and of itself; a judicial contest; any dispute. When a person begins a civil lawsuit, the person enters into a process called litigation. and work out of the firm's Los Angeles and Washington offices. During his time as head of Customs and Border Protection, Bonner created the "container security initiative The Container Security Initiative (CSI) was launched in 2002 by the U.S. Bureau of Customs and Border Protection (CBP), an agency of the Department of Homeland Security. Its purpose was to increase security for container cargo shipped to the United States. ," which secured imports to the U.S. from potential terrorist threats. Bonner announced his resignation on Sept. 28, about a week before a report by the Homeland Security Department's Office of the Inspector General Office of the Inspector General (or OIG) is a common sub-agency within cabinet-level agencies of the United States federal government and serves as auditing and investigative arm of the agency's programs focused on identifying waste, fraud and abuse. revealed conflicts between Bonner's division and another Homeland Security division, Immigration immigration, entrance of a person (an alien) into a new country for the purpose of establishing permanent residence. Motives for immigration, like those for migration generally, are often economic, although religious or political factors may be very important. and Customs Enforcement. The report was prepared in anticipation of a possible merger of the two divisions. Conflicts created competition between the agencies for resources and detracted from security efforts, according to the report. He said his resignation had nothing to do with the recent report. "I've been going a mile a minute since the morning of 9/11, and at the four-year mark I thought I had done my duty," he said. "That had absolutely nothing to do with my decision to leave." But he admits that merging the two departments would be a good idea. "By separating out customs investigators from front-line inspectors, it's cutting off a part of your anatomy," he said. "It's like taking a police department and dividing out the uniform cops from the detectives and making two departments with two chiefs. It won't happen." Bonner originally joined Gibson Dunn as a litigation partner in 1993 after serving as administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) was established in 1973 by President richard m. nixon as part of the Justice Department, thus uniting a number of federal drug agencies that had often worked at cross-purposes. for three years. Before that, he was a U.S. district judge in Los Angeles and U.S. attorney of the Central District of California from 1984 to 1989. Bonner, who has a daughter and grandchildren in Los Angeles, will live in Pasadena. Staff reporter Amanda Bronstad can be reached at (323) 549-5225, ext. 225, or at abronstad@labusinessjournal.com. |
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