Hernandez v. Mesa
U.S. Supreme Court · decided February 25, 2020 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Decided
- February 25, 2020
- Term
- October Term 2019
- Vote
- 5–4
- Majority author
- Justice Alito
- Issue area
- Economic Activity
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice ALITO delivered the opinion of the Court. We are asked in this case to extend Bivens v. Six Unknown Fed. Narcotics Agents , 403 U.S. 388, 91 S.Ct. 1999, 29 L.Ed.2d 619 (1971), and create a damages remedy for a cross-border shooting. As we have made clear in many prior cases, however, the Constitution's separation of powers requires us to exercise caution before extending Bivens to a new "context," and a claim based on a cross-border shooting arises in a context that is markedly new. Unlike any previously recognized Bivens claim, a cross-border shooting claim has foreign relations and national security implications. In addition, Congress has been notably hesitant to create claims based on allegedly tortious conduct abroad. Because of the distinctive characteristics of cross-border shooting claims, we refuse to extend Bivens into this new field. I The facts of this tragic case are set forth in our earlier opinion in this matter, Hernández v. Mesa , 582 U.S. ----, 137 S.Ct. 2003, 198 L.Ed.2d 625 (2017) (per curiam ). Sergio Adrián Hernández Güereca, a 15-year-old Mexican national, was with a group of friends in a concrete culvert that separates El Paso, Texas, from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. The border runs through the center of the culvert, which was designed to hold the waters of the Rio Grande River but is now largely dry. Border Patrol Agent Jesus Mesa, Jr., detained one…
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