ASU law professor comments on lawsuit in US-Mexico border death

Professor Aaron Fellmeth, a faculty fellow in the College of Law's Center for Law and Global Affairs at Arizona State University, was recently quoted in a Los Angeles Times article titled "Mother suing Border Patrol in Mexico boy's 2012 death wants answers."

The article examines the lawsuit filed by the mother of a Mexican teenager killed in Mexico by a U.S. Border Patrol agent. The lawsuit filed by the mother's attorney and the American Civil Liberties Union seeks monetary and punitive damages for what they contend is the wrongful death of the teenager.

One dispute in the case stems from the question of whether U.S. laws protect foreign individuals on foreign soil. Fellmeth expressed his doubts of whether U.S. constitutional protections would apply to the teenager.

"I would say they have an uphill battle," said Fellmeth.

Non-U.S. citizens in the United States have most constitutional rights, except those relating to the rights and duties of citizenship, such as the right to vote, Fellmeth said. Non-U.S. citizens outside the country have a weaker basis for claiming constitutional rights.

"In the distant past, the U.S. Supreme Court decisively denied constitutional protections to aliens outside the United States. In fact, it denied constitutional protections to U.S. citizens outside the United States as well, so aliens didn't have much of a chance," Fellmeth said.

Fellmeth's research and teaching focuses on international law jurisprudence and the formation of rules of customary international law in contested subjects. Professor Fellmeth's works have been cited several times by federal courts and in testimony before Congress. He has served as an Executive Advisory Committee member of International Legal Materials, and is currently chair of the International Law Association (American Branch) International IP Law Committee.