Texas Cross-Border Fatal Shooting Case by Officer Returned by Supreme Court to a Lower Court
A family in Juarez, Mexico, is seeking justice in the death of a 15-year-old Mexican teenager who was allegedly shot by a U.S. agent. The case went to the U.S. Supreme Court. On Monday, June 26, 2017, the Supreme Court opted to send the case back to a lower court. Sergio Hernandez Guereca, the teen who was allegedly killed at the Texas-Mexico border in 2010, was shot on the Mexico side when he looked out from behind a concrete pillar at agents on the U.S. side. Rocks had allegedly been thrown at the Border Patrol agents. The use-of-force policies followed by the Border Patrol changed following the teen’s death and other cross-border shootings involving alleged rock throwing. The incidents have been highly controversial. Border agents are now strongly encouraged to simply move away from the range of projectiles that are thrown, rather than acting with excessive force.
At one point in the legal battles around the death of Hernandez, a Court of Appeals ruled that the Border Patrol agent who allegedly shot the teen qualified for immunity. This means he cannot be sued. The Supreme Court vacated that ruling, saying that the judgment was a mistake. The high court also said that Ziglar v. Abbasi, another case decided last week, could be relevant to the teen’s case. It’s something the lower court would not have been able to consider when making a ruling.
Whatever the final decision in this complex case turns out to be, it will have an effect on several Mexican families who have allegedly suffered loss as a result of cross-border shootings of loved ones.
–Guest Contributor
smchugh
smchugh