A Mexican woman has recently been granted the rights to sue the U.S. government, as a group of border patrol agents recently shot and killed her son in a cross-border shooting.
The decision has gathered attention as it breaches laws applied to foreigners who do not reside within the U.S.
The ruling is a major victory for immigrant rights groups and security analysts.
The judge who presided over the case stated in his ruling:
We recognize that Border Patrol agents protect the United States from unlawful entries and terrorist threats. Those activities help guarantee our national security. But no one suggests that national security involves shooting people who are just walking down a street in Mexico … We cannot imagine anyone whose conscience would not be shocked by the cold-blooded murder of an innocent person walking down the street in Mexico or Canada by a U.S. Border Patrol agent on the American side of the border”
Agent Lonnie Swartz shot the woman’s sixteen-year-old son ten times through the border wall in 2012, ultimately killing him.
Swartz’s reaction was unacceptable under any circumstances, even if his actions had not resulted in the boy’s death.
The case was concerned with the legality of the woman filing a lawsuit in the U.S.
Judges have decided that the woman’s case is protected under the Fourth and Fifth Amendments.
The president of the National Border Patrol Council released a rather bold and harsh response to the ruling, saying:
Unfortunately, we live in a time that even with judges, facts and the law are mere suggestions when they go contrary to one’s personal political ideology. “I believe when all is said and done … the courts will find that persons in another country when an action takes place do not have the right to sue in the United States.”
Featured Image via Wikimedia Commons
