More than half a dozen members of the U.S. Department of Justice are being sued by the family of a Border Patrol agent killed as a result of the controversial “Fast and Furious” gun operation.

Agent Brian Terry was murdered in December 2010 by cartel members in Arizona using firearms purchased illegally from Lone Wolf Trading Co., a gun shop participating in the operation at the request of U.S. government agents.

The weapons were among 2,000 lost by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) during Operation Fast and Furious, which ATF launched as a way to track down those running Mexican drug cartels.

Terry’s relatives are going after Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley and six ATF agents involved in the operation. Attorney General Eric Holder, who was cleared of any liability by an investigation from the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General, was not named as a defendant.

The lawsuit contends the ATF agents “created, organized, implemented, supervised, and participated in Operation Fast and Furious despite the foreseeable certainty that the Mexican drug cartels who defendant Lone Wolf sold firearms to and who the ATF defendants and defendant Hurley intended to receive the firearms would then use those weapons to cause injury and death to members of the public, including and especially other law enforcement officers like Brian Terry.”

-Noel Brinkerhoff

To Learn More:

Terry Family Sues Feds for Fast & Furious Bungle (by Jamie Ross, Courthouse News Service)

Brian Terry family sues ATF officials in Fast and Furious (by Sharyl Attkisson, CBS News)

Terry Lawsuit: District Court Document

ATF Program Let Hundreds of Guns go to Drug Cartels (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)