When troops fight crime at home, bystanders are bound to get hurt. It might
well be that Marine Cpl. Clemente Banuelos was just doing his job on May
20. The trouble was, it was a job he, as a military man, should not have
been doing.

A Texas grand jury decided not to bring an indictment against Banuelos for
the fatal shooting of Esquiel Hernandez, Jr., an 18year old high school
student with no criminal record. Military authorities have said Hernandez,
who was tending goats in a rural area and did have a .22 rifle, had fired
shots and was preparing to fire again at three camouflaged Marines when
Banuelos killed him.

Texas Rangers and local prosecutors who investigated the shooting have
disputed that account. An autopsy report suggests that Hernandez was not
facing Banuelos when he was shot.

The grand jury apparently believed the military's version.

Whatever the specifics turn out to be, such a tragedy was virtually
inevitable. Banuelos was part of a borderarea drug surveillance mission
when he encountered Hernandez. Such missions have been suspended pending a
review.

They should be ended.

Granted, American military forces since the end of the Cold War have been
used in all sorts of nontraditional ways. But the essential mission of our
military is to be prepared to fight wars to kill or neutralize as
efficiently as possible people determined to be the enemy. That's not the
same as the mission of law enforcement. Each requires different skills and
different attitudes.

That, along with political dangers inherent when military people are
deployed against U.S. citizens rather than foreign enemies, is the main
reason that for most of its history the United States has not permitted
military units to engage in domestic law enforcement. In fact, the Posse
Comitatus laws were passed after abuses following the Civil War to control
such deployment, but they were considerably weakened as the war on drugs
was escalated during the first Reagan administration.

The killing of Esquiel Hernandez underlines the wisdom of the historic
policy against domestic military intervention. The administration, after
this review, should announce that henceforth military personnel will not be
used to aid, supplement or displace domestic law enforcement.

Congress should back it up by strengthening the Posse Comitatus laws.