Supreme Court amicus briefs on gun crime in Mexico
In Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc. v. Estados Unidos Mexicanos, the Mexican government is suing several of the most popular American firearm manufacturers in an attempt to hold them liable for violence committed by Mexican drug cartels in Mexico. The Mexican government seeks billions of dollars in damages and the imposition of extensive gun controls in America.
This post is coauthored with Joseph Greenlee, who is a research associate at the Independence Institute (where I work) and Director of the Office of Litigation Counsel for the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action.
We filed an amicus brief on behalf of the National Rifle Association, FPC Action Foundation, and Independence Institute in support of the American manufacturers. The State of Montana, joined by 25 more states, filed a brief as well. In response to these two briefs, a group of social science, medical, and legal scholars supporting the Mexican government joined a brief filed by Crowell & Moring aimed at refuting our claims. This post addresses their arguments.
Homicides in Mexico after the 2004 repeal of the American “assault weapon” ban
Mexico’s amici accuse us of denying “there has been a significant increase in gun violence in Mexico since the expiration of the U.S. assault weapons ban in 2004.” They fault us for “conflat[ing] the Mexican homicide rate . . . with the overall rate of national gun violence.” Actually, it was the Mexican government that argued “homicides in Mexico . . . increased dramatically beginning in 2004.” Mexico Complaint at ¶ 13 (emphasis added). And the Mexican government has focused its statistical case on the number of homicides and the homicide rate. E.g., Complaint at ¶¶ 14, 279, 440, 441, 442, 444, 450, 471, 472.
Our brief provided statistics—which the amici did not dispute—that “Mexico’s homicide rate was lower during each of the first three years after the ban’s expiration (2005–2007) than during any year in which the ban was in effect (1995–2003).” The plaintiff, the Mexican executive branch, incorrectly told courts that Mexican homicides “increased dramatically beginning in 2004.”
In later years, Mexican homicides have increases. We argued that the increases were caused by the Mexican government’s military offensive against its own citizens, the militarization of public security forces, government corruption, the government’s failure to punish criminal conduct, and the Mexican government’s human rights violations—including unlawful killings by police and military, forced disappearance by government agents, torture committed by security forces, and violence against journalists. In other words, the homicide increase is the result of the Mexican government’s own misdeeds and failures, not the American manufacturers’ lawful activity.
ATF Traces of Firearms Seized in Mexico
Our statement in the amicus brief that “few Mexican crime guns are determined to have come from America” is factual. The Mexican government claimed that “Almost all guns recovered at crime scenes in Mexico—70% to 90% of them—were trafficked from the U.S.” But this percentage is based on the number of
Article from Reason.com
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