Thread: Foreign inmates cannot sue over lack of consulate contact

What new reasons will lawyers come up with next to sue?

Court: Foreign inmates cannot sue over lack of consulate contact

By: TERI FIGUEROA - Staff Writer

A federal court of appeals found Monday that foreign inmates cannot sue if police violate an international treaty by failing to tell the inmate he can contact his country's embassy after his arrest.

The case involves a Mexican national who lived in Fallbrook.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found that the Vienna Convention, an international treaty to which the United States is a signatory, applies to nations, not individuals. The treaty confers no private rights to individual detainees, and thus does not give individual people the right to sue for damages in such cases.

The lawsuit, filed in 2005, alleged that San Diego Sheriff's deputies violated the constitutional rights of then-Fallbrook resident Ezequiel Nunez Cornejo, 39, when they did not tell Cornejo at the time of his arrest for drug and gun possession about his right to contact the Mexican consulate.

Genaro Lara, the San Diego attorney representing Cornejo, said Monday that he plans to continue to pursue the case.

"We are going to take this case up to the Supreme Court," Lara said, adding that federal courts in districts like New York have ruled in favor of allowing individuals to sue over violations of the Vienna Convention.

The attorney representing San Diego County in the case did not immediately return a call for comment.

In agreeing with the trial judge's decision to dismiss the Cornejo's case, Circuit Justice Pamela Ann Rymer wrote that the treaty "does not unambiguously give Cornejo" an individual right to be told he can speak to consulate officials, even though, "for sure, he should have been notified" that he could do so.

In her dissenting opinion, Circuit Judge D.W. Nelson wrote that not only does the treaty does confer rights to individuals, those rights are enforceable by courts.

Superior Court criminal case records showed Cornejo pleaded guilty March 1, 2005 to marijuana transportation, possessing a firearm while possessing methamphetamine, and driving under the influence of drugs. He was sentenced to one year in jail and three years on probation, court records showed.

Lara said his client is not seeking to have his conviction overturned, but wants to sue local governments on his claims that police violated provisions of the treaty.

At the time he filed his federal civil suit, Cornejo also asked the court to make the case into a class action encompassing foreign nationals arrested locally between May 1, 2003, and April 1, 2005. Cornejo's claim argued that had he and others like him been told they were allowed to have consular assistance, their cases may have had different outcomes.

The district court tossed the case before addressing the issue of making it into a class action.

-- Contact staff writer Teri Figueroa at (760) 631-6624 or tfigueroa@nctimes.com.

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/09 ... _24_07.txt

Did I read that correctly.....the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals didn't side with an illegal alien?

Is that the same Ninth Circuit which always seems to entertain them?

"We are going to take this case up to the Supreme Court," Lara said

Note that the defendant pled guilty in March of 2005, about 30 months ago. It will take almost another year to process it up to the Supreme Court just to learn if they will hear the case. If he should win on this narrow issue it will be sent back to the trial court and the process will start all over again. The defendant is still in the U.S. He has already won.

Lara said his client is not seeking to have his conviction overturned, but wants to sue local governments...

Apparently these illegal alien lawyers have passed the bottom of the barrel. To hell with justice, let's sue everybody! Turns my stomach that this scum is in the Nation.

Originally Posted by gofer

Lara said his client is not seeking to have his conviction overturned, but wants to sue local governments...

Apparently these illegal alien lawyers have passed the bottom of the barrel. To hell with justice, let's sue everybody! Turns my stomach that this scum is in the Nation.[/quote





Of course he wants to sue. The court system has become the illegals' version of "Who Wants to Be A Millionaire?" and these lawyers are having a hay day of it because it's the only clientele they can get.

The odd thing is that we've paid to educate all of these "lawyers" and they're stabbing us all in the eye with the pen we used to write their tuition checks

Plenty of comments left after this article at the source link.
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Federal court rejects claim in civil rights case


UNION-TRIBUNE

6:53 a.m. September 27, 2007

DOWNTOWN SAN DIEGO: A federal appeals court has ruled that foreign nationals who are arrested in the United States can't bring a federal civil rights suit if police don't tell them they can call their consulate.
The 2-1 decision by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals came in a case of Ezequiel Cornejo, a Mexican man who was arrested by San Diego County sheriff's deputies in Fallbrook in 2004. He eventually pleaded guilty to charges of driving under the influence of drugs, and gun and drug possession.

Cornejo later filed a federal lawsuit alleging his civil rights were violated because the deputies did not advise him that he could contact his consulate. His suit argued that Article 36 of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations mandates that advice.

The appellate court ruled that the provision does not allow an individual the right to sue a local government for civil rights violations. The decision upheld a lower court ruling that threw out the suit, which had targeted San Diego County, as well as the cities of San Diego, Escondido and Oceanside. –G.M.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metr ... ulate.html