Supreme Court Punts Cross-border Shooting Case Back to Lower Court

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court avoided ruling Monday on whether the family of a Mexican teenager who was killed by a U.S. Border Patrol agent has the right to sue the border patrol, sending the case back to a lower court with instructions for further proceedings.The case began almost seven years ago, when the agent shot and killed Sergio Hernández, a 15-year-old who had been playing with his friends in the concrete culvert winding along the El Paso-Juárez border.The agent, Jesus Mesa Jr., was standing in El Paso when he fired the gun. Hernández was standing in Juárez when he died.If Hernández had been a U.S. citizen, or if he was in El Paso at the time of his death, his family would have had standing to sue the border patrol. But because Hernández was a Mexican citizen in Mexico, lower courts ruled that he had no “voluntary connection” to the U.S. and no constitutional protections.  Continue reading...