First Circuit kelps a lawsuit filed be Mexico agains several gun manufacturers

[KyJim]

​Mexico sued a number of gun makers seeking 10 billion in damages because of guns making their way illegally into Mexico. The Court said Mexico had plausibly stated a claim because the federal law generally giving immunity to gun makers only applies to legal sales, not to illegally trafficked guns into another country.

News story by Reuters at https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-...rs-2024-01-22/

The opinion can be found at http://media.ca1.uscourts.gov/pdf.op...-1823P-01A.pdf. It is 60 pages long and I have not yet read it.

[ballardw]

"Kelps"? Is that a typo for "Helps" or a legal term of some sort?

[Aguila Blanca]

If the firearms were trafficked illegally, in order to assign any liability to the manufacturers Mexico is going to have to prove that the manufacturers knew about, aided and abetted the illegal trafficking.

Good luck wit dat.

[44 AMP]

I see several possibilities, (in no particular order)

The judge is personally a rabid gun hater and is allowing the suit to go forward in the hope of damaging the firearms industry.

The judge is a functional idiot who thinks the Mexican suit has merit, and should be heard in court.

The Judge is a shrewd clever person who recognizes the suit has no merit, but needs its day in court, so that it may be slapped down HARD, so the entire idea won't be brought up again.

The Mexican govt is doing this as a publicity stunt, to try and blame the US (and gunmakers specifically) for their own failure to enforce their own laws.

I'm sure there are other possibilities, but these are what comes to my mind, first.

Here's a thought, (I have no idea the legal hoops needed to do so) but would it be possible to require the Mexican govt (or better yet, some outside, INDEPENDENT agency) to do an inventory?? The US govt has given a lot of military arms to Mexico as "foreign aid" over the years. I'd like to see some numbers comparing what we gave to Mexico (and I mean by type and number (10K M16s and 1500 M60s for example, actual numbers) compared to what they still have.

Personally I'd have a hard time awarding compensation to the govt of Mexico for harm and damage to their nation due to guns they allowed to be stolen from their Army.

But, that's just me, and probably why I would never be seated on such a jury.

[DaleA]

I just cannot fathom how anyone could dream up something like this.

This was first proposed a couple of years ago and got shot down, pun intended, but now it's back.

And guess what? When it was originally proposed, two countries, Antigua and Barbuda, a Caribbean island state, and Belize, along with the District of Columbia and 13 other states--Massachusetts, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawai‘i, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, and Oregon supported this lawsuit.

Yep. Minnesota. My state. On it's way to becoming a cold California. Very disheartening.

[44 AMP]

In practical terms it changes nothing, but I make a distinction between the people of a country or state and what they support, and what the people running the state support. Often they are very different things.

[Metal god]

I’m not sure where I read it might’ve been this forum might’ve been some other forum might’ve been on YouTube not sure. Regardless, this lawsuit has been going on for a while , If I recall . If I remember correctly, the consensus was that the federal government (ours) kind of incentivized lack of a better term the Mexican government to file this suit. This was to be just another way to be a thorn in the side of the firearms industry.

Over the last 10 years, it seems to be pretty clear that one of the primary goals of the anti-gun movement is to financially burden anyone involved . This is clearly a frivolous lawsuit but it’s still going to cost lots of money and this is the type of lawsuit that you don’t get to recoup the money you spent . I mean , what are the defendants going to do if they win , insist the Mexican government pay their legal fees . Yeah, right !

I don’t know how but it seems we as a nation need to stop allowing the government from attacking industry and incentivizing others to do so as well . I’ve not been following politics that closely or how the government regulates industry in general my whole life 50+ years or the history per se. It sure seems like the government is becoming more and more openly hostile to industries in general . I don’t know if that’s always been the case or if there’s been this huge uptick in the last 20 years, which seems to be the case to me but to be fair, I’ve only been paying attention to it for the last 20ish years .

It’s one thing to reasonably regulate it’s a whole other thing to openly try to destroy .

[44 AMP]

I don’t know how but it seems we as a nation need to stop allowing the government from attacking industry and incentivizing others to do so as well

IF you look you'll see there is a pattern between which industries get attacked and the political ideology of the administration doing it.

Those with the "green dream" fixation attack fossil fuel industries. Those who believe guns, (not people) are the cause of evil go after the gun industry and gun ownership. Often one finds both obsessions in the same set of people, and when they are in power, they do what makes them feel good about their beliefs.

The whole "Mexico harmed by US made guns" thing was encouraged (possibly created) by the Obama administration. "Fast and Furious" wasn't the only thing that they did (and, did badly).