By Editorial Board
Arizona Republic
Either the Constitution means something or it doesn’t.
When a U.S. cop shoots a Mexican kid through the border fence, it might be tempting to apply a more convenient standard.
But it won’t wash.
A federal judge in Tucson said the young man’s mother can take her case against a Border Patrol agent to court. She says the agent violated her son’s constitutional rights by firing through the fence and killing him on a sidewalk in Mexico.
“At its heart, this is a case alleging excessive deadly force by a U.S. Border Patrol agent standing on American soil brought before a United States Federal District Court tasked with upholding the United States Constitution,” U.S. District Court Judge Raner Collins wrote.
His order lets the case go forward. It does not determine the merits of the lawsuit.
The case matters because the Border Patrol has faced repeated allegations of human rights violations, ranging from the petty to the fatal. The agency lacks transparency and accountability.
What’s more, Collins says he “respectfully disagrees” with a Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that declined to extend constitutional protections to another youth shot in Mexico by U.S. agents firing across the line from Texas.
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