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[Dr.Acula]

Here's an interesting case I came across while listening to CBC radio.

tl;dr Several years ago, a border agent fired from the US, into Mexico. The border agent said several teens were throwing rocks at him, but later footage showed he was lying. The US refused to extradite. Now, the matter of if the Mexican surviving family members can sue is now being heard by the supreme court.

If the victim were an American, or in America, he would have been afforded certain consitutional protections. Because of his status as a Mexican in Mexico when he was shot by an American in America, the legal matter is muddied.

Two cases are being used as possible precedent. One from 1990 where the constitution does not protect foreigners from search and seizure, the other from 2008 that gave constitutional protections to detainees in Guantanamo Bay.

The writer of the majority in each case?

Anthony Kennedy.

The gun was fired in the United States. The bullet stopped 60 feet away in Mexico — tragically, in the head of a 15-year-old boy named Sergio Adrián Hernández Güereca.

Border patrol agent Jesus Mesa Jr. pulled the trigger that day six years ago in the wide concrete culvert that separates El Paso from Juarez, Mexico. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court will consider whether the Constitution gives Hernández’s parents the right to sue Mesa in American courts for killing their son.

If Hernández had been killed inside the United States, then the case could proceed. Or if he had been a U.S. citizen, it would not have mattered that Mesa was on one side of the border and he was on the other.

But the courts so far in Hernández’s case have said the Constitution does not reach across the border — even 60 feet — to give rights to those without a previous connection to the United States.

But lawyers for the parents say there must be recourse for killing an unarmed teenager playing with his friends. Halting the case before it is even tried, their brief tells the Supreme Court, erects “a legal no-man’s land in which federal agents can kill innocent civilians with impunity.

Hernández’s death attracted more than the usual headlines, partly because of the boy’s age and partly because cellphone videos of the incident contradicted the border patrol’s initial explanations.

The agency said Mesa was under attack from rock-throwing youths on the other side of the culvert that follows the Rio Grande as he tried to break up an attempt to enter the United States.

But the videos showed Hernández and the others apparently playing a child’s game in which they ran up the steep concrete bank, touched the high fence on the U.S. side, and ran back to Mexico.

Two U.S. investigations found there were no grounds on which to charge or reprimand Mesa. He was indicted on a charge of murder in Mexico, but the United States refused to extradite him.

In a 1990 case called United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, a four-member plurality of the court ruled that the Constitution does not protect noncitizens from the prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures by government agents beyond the border.

But in a 2008 case, Boumediene v. Bush, regarding the rights of those held at Guantanamo Bay, the court took what is called a “functional’ approach to border issues. It said the totality of the circumstances, not just location, must be considered.

Key to both issues was Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. He wrote the majority opinion in the Boumediene case, and wrote a concurring opinion in the Verdugo-Urquidez case that provided a majority for the outcome.

Lock if old, couldn't find mention on this issue.

Source WaPo article.

 

[Shake Appeal]

Finally, a problem a better border wall would solve.

 

[DirgeExtinction]

Finally, a problem a better border wall would solve.

Yeah, it could protect Mexican citizens from getting shot by US border patrol.

 

[Jonnax]

Two U.S. investigations found there were no grounds on which to charge or reprimand Mesa. He was indicted on a charge of murder in Mexico, but the United States refused to extradite him.

So border guards can murder people across the border and get away with it?

Well I guess it's similar to how police officers get away with murdering black people inside the country, just that they have to go through a trial to have the veneer of due process.

 

[Shake Appeal]

Yeah, it could protect Mexican citizens from getting shot by US border patrol.

That's the joke?

 

[RJT]

Finally, a problem a better border wall would solve.

Damn, first post gaf strikes again...

 

[MUnited83]

So you can just go and murder people from Mexico as long as you don't cross the border?


This is not abusable at all, no sir.

 

[mackattk]

So you can just go and murder people from Mexico as long as you don't cross the border?


This is not abusable at all, no sir.

Basically means I don't like somebody? shove them across the border and THEN kill them.

 

[Gutek]

Basically means I don't like somebody? shove them across the border and THEN kill them.

If they're not citizen or residents, you mean.

 

[Glix]

Finally, a problem a better border wall would solve.

I don't see how a border wall would stop these guys. They could just sit on the wall and have target practice.

 

[God Dayumm]

So you can just go and murder people from Mexico as long as you don't cross the border?


This is not abusable at all, no sir.

What if a nuke casually and nonchalantly flies over the border and crashes in Mexico?

 

[Boney]

In Israel they at least taunt the kids into throwing rocks before killing them.

Gg America

 

[HawksWinStanley]

That's the joke?

You played it perfectly and still someone managed to not only not get the joke but also try to correct you. Brutal, but I guess it wouldn't be GAF if we didn't have at least one in every thread.

 

[Ray Wonder]

I don't see how a border wall would stop these guys. They could just sit on the wall and have target practice.

I doubt the wall would be perch-able like a castle wall lol

Maybe it would, who knows lol

 

[hawkshockey11]

Wait so theoretically people from Mexico can just pick off American border patrol agents from their side? What the fuck

 

[Thebeardofknowledge]

Fuck that border agent

Deserves to be in jail and sued

 

[Jenov]

The US should not have refused extradition, that's messed up.

 

[Morts]

Murdering a kid seems like a good enough reason for extradition.

 

[Pai Pai Master]

I doubt the wall would be perch-able like a castle wall lol

Maybe it would, who knows lol

You can bet your ass they have every intention of putting snipers up on that wall

 

[DirgeExtinction]

You played it perfectly and still someone managed to not only not get the joke but also try to correct you. Brutal, but I guess it wouldn't be GAF if we didn't have at least one in every thread.

I wasn't trying to correct them, lol. I thought we basically said the same thing.

 

[Joni]

So you can just go and murder people from Mexico as long as you don't cross the border?

This is not abusable at all, no sir.

You can already do that with native reservations.

 

[YuriLowell]

Wait so theoretically people from Mexico can just pick off American border patrol agents from their side? What the fuck

I guess it goes both ways.

 

[Gentleman Jack]

I remember this case. Customs immediately went with a 'he was no angel' posture to justify the homicide.

The 15-year-old Mexican youth who was shot and killed by a Border Patrol agent had a history of involvement with human smuggling and was on a list of repeat juvenile offenders, U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman Mark Qualia told CNN Thursday.

Didn't take long for the offending officer's story to completely fall apart, too. Dude was blind firing off balance from a crouching posture one handed at a kid. There's only one reason to do that.

 

[TalonJH]

Murdering a kid seems like a good enough reason for extradition.

My thoughts as well.

 

[1044]

Wait so theoretically people from Mexico can just pick off American border patrol agents from their side? What the fuck

Interesting. With how relations between US and Mexico seem to be going, maybe we will eventually see the creation of a demilitarized zone like between North and South Korea.

 

[BibiMaghoo]

Murdering a kid seems like a good enough reason for extradition.

Don't be silly. It isn't murder if it's law enforcement. It's just a mistake, at worst, after public outcry.

 

[Earthstrike]

So anyone wanna take a wild stab at whether the customs agent would describe himself as pro-life?