In October 2012, a U.S. Border Patrol agent fired through the 20-foot steel fence separating Nogales, Arizona, from Nogales, Mexico, and killed an unarmed, 16-year-old Mexican boy.
This was not an isolated incident by a rogue agent, but the latest in a string of cross-border shootings that raise serious questions about the oversight and accountability of the Border Patrol. In the last three years, Border Patrol agents have killed six Mexican citizens on their native soil and have fired through the border to threaten and injure even more.
None of these cases has led to any known disciplinary action or criminal charges against the border police, and U.S. courts have rejected claims made by victims’ families, asserting that Mexican citizens do not have the same constitutional protections as Americans.
Fault Lines travels to the bordertown of Nogales—presently the nexus for this increasingly lawless law enforcement—to meet the Mexican families who have lost their young sons at the hands of U.S. agents, who many accuse of being immune from the law.
Original air date: September 8, 2013
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