Arizona court rules Mexico can proceed with lawsuit against five US gun dealers

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: The Guardian

Tue 26 Mar 2024 16.39 EDT
Last modified on Tue 26 Mar 2024 17.58 EDT


A trial court in Arizona has ruled that the Mexican government may proceed in its trailblazing lawsuit against five US gun dealers, who stand accused of facilitating gun trafficking across the border into Mexico.

Mexico argues that the companies’ marketing campaigns and distribution practices mean that they are legally responsible for the bloodshed that their guns contribute to.

This is the second such case that the Mexican government has brought in US courts this year, having also accused US gun manufacturers of facilitating the cross-border arms traffic in a case in Massachusetts. “[The Mexican lawsuits] emphasise the responsibility of companies regarding how they produce and sell their weapons,” said Carlos Pérez-Ricart, a political scientist in Mexico.

Gun sales are highly restricted in Mexico itself, where there is just one gun store, run by the state. Yet the Mexican government estimates that 200,000 firearms are smuggled over the border from the US every year.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/mar/26/mexico-lawsuit-us-gun-dealers

[moniss]

1. Several years ago I was in San Antonio

and read a good, lengthy investigative article in the San Antonio paper about the problem of gun shops on the US side of the border that were basically "ammunition depots" for nefarious people operating in Mexico in the gangs. They would order huge quantities of assault weapon ammunition and then show up with a van to load it to the hilt. I don't recall how they were sneaking it back across the border or if they were "off-loading" into boats etc. The reporter asked one shop owner if he didn't think it was suspicious about what someone would be doing that they needed to buy so much ammunition all at once. He told the reporter point blank it was legal, it was none of his business and that he didn't care.

It was the kind of good in-depth, many pages long reporting we used to see from good journalists in papers like the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Philadelphia Inquirer etc. before Gannett etc. destroyed that kind of publication and reporting. About the last really good reporting like that I came across was in the Des Moines Register about 12 years or so ago and it was a similar "on the border" story in a way but with a twist. This one was about the towns that border the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota that despite being tiny in size have multiple liquor stores and "places" where drug dealing is free-wheeling. All done to feed off the addiction, poverty and despair on the reservation.

But we're in the age of the short attention span and libraries are like ghost towns now.

[BumRushDaShow]

2. What you described mirrors 2 different things that came to my mind

One was the apparent "business model" of a certain subset of pharmacies that stockpiled opioids and ultimately became "distributors" of opioids to addicts, where those who really needed them for pain management, had to jump through huge, flame-encircled hoops to get their own scripts filled.

The argument was that the "excessive" quantities were spoken for because of supposedly "legit" prescriptions but later found to be coming from just a handful of "pill mill" doctors. In some cases, the pharmacy chain corporate looked the other way as did some states.

The other thing that came to mind was about here in PA where we have state-controlled liquor stores and how whenever anyone goes over a Delaware River bridge to Jersey from Philly, right at the base of the bridge were piles of liquor stores. Similarly rolling down I-95 to Delaware and there were those stores at the exits.

(however supposedly the parking lots of those stores were being monitored for large buys heading to Philly where the state police can stop someone )

[moniss]

3. Yes indeed about the business model

and I can remember back in the '80's/'90's period when I would go through Florida and I would see small storefronts in almost every mall and the sign would just say "Pain Clinic". Being from the North I had never seen this and when I asked about them I was told that all you had to do to get a prescription for opioids was to tell them you hurt your back. No real "exam" took place. When the fellow told me this I was floored and I said to him how crazy that was because of the explosion of addiction that would come along. He was from California and my age and he too had seen the damage of substance abuse, particularly with barbiturates, alcohol and amphetamines in the '50's and rolling into the '60's. Then of course came even worse. But apparently the "new business model" in Florida was so lucrative that companies took it nationwide.

Your reminder about state run liquor stores and stores just over the border reminded me of a far more innocent time in Wisconsin history. Of course we are "America's Dairyland" and there are people who take that very seriously. It was such a serious thing that back in the '50's it was illegal to sell or distribute "colored" margarine. Because it is not a dairy product in any way the powers that be didn't want people to be fooled by "fake butter". However you could buy uncolored margarine that looked like Crisco and it came with a packet of food coloring and you could mix that up but it was an unappetizing mess and it would leach color when you went in and out of the refrigerator. So nobody wanted that mess.

But Illinois did not have the law banning "colored margarine". So stores along the border would see all kinds of cars with Wisconsin license plates buying large quantities of the forbidden substance. Yes the cops did sort of watch but they never really bothered the small time person who just bought 5 pounds or so for themselves. But people with a trunk full had some explaining to do. But most of us would stare straight ahead if we saw a cop car and breathe a sigh of relief when they didn't come after us. So back to "America's Dairyland" we would go with our beautiful, yellow contraband knowing we were "smugglers" but comforting ourselves with our lower priced spread melting nicely on our toast.

[DoBW]

4. And nothing to do with 2A

International criminal conspiracy period. bring the red notices