PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad - The Trinidad and Tobago government has welcomed a ruling by the United States Appeals Court that ruled in favor of Mexico’s attempts to file a lawsuit against US gun manufacturers alleging that their negligent business practices facilitate the illicit trafficking of their products into Mexico.
Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley welcomes US court ruling in favour of Mexico on exportation of illegal guns (File Photo)Last year, Antigua and Barbuda, Belize, The Bahamas, Jamaica, St Vincent and the Grenadines and Trinidad and Tobago had joined an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief filed by Mexico appealing a decision in US court to hold gun makers responsible for facilitating the trafficking of deadly weapons across the border.
“The guns used in the commission of violent crimes in The Bahamas are not manufactured here, but instead, are manufactured abroad and illegally trafficked across our borders,” a statement issued by the Office of the Prime Minister in The Bahamas read in part.
The regional leaders at the end of a two-day symposium on violence as a public health issue last April, declared a war on guns to combat the illegal trade which they said “provides the weapons that contribute significantly to crime and violence in our region”
In their declaration titled “War on Guns” the regional leaders said they were also calling on the United States to join the Caribbean in “our war on guns and urgently adopt and take action to stop the illegal exportation of firearms and ammunition into the Caribbean.
In an unprecedented decision earlier this week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston, Massachusetts ruled in favour of the Mexican government, unanimously ruling that Mexico had successfully demonstrated that the arms manufacturers and distributors do not enjoy immunity for their negligent business practices, which facilitate the illicit trafficking of their products into Mexico.
In August 2021, the Mexico had filed a US$10 billion civil lawsuit for damages against US gun manufacturers that, through their carelessness and negligence, actively facilitate the trafficking of their products into Mexican territory.
But in September 2022, the trial court judge dismissed the lawsuit on the grounds that a federal law called the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) protected and gave immunity to the defendant companies even when the damage caused by their carelessness and negligence occurred in Mexican territory. Mexico then filed an appeal.
In welcoming the ruling of the three panel judges, Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley said this development should cause all manufacturers and dealers to be more responsible in their trading in these items and make it more difficult for those who would engage in actions that are harming our country.
“I feel satisfied that it was a good thing for Trinidad and Tobago to align itself with the arguments and the Mexican lawsuit because we face the same problem that Mexico is complaining about,” Rowley told the Trinidad Express newspaper.
Rowley, who is leading a delegation to the United States on Sunday for talks with US officials regarding the exportation of illegal guns, told the newspaper “whatever the final outcome of this lawsuit …this will certainly cause gun manufacturers and distributors in the US to pay attention and take pause as they shovel volumes of dangerous items into our countries without the least bit of care as to the damage and destruction that these guns and ammunition are having in on our vulnerable societies”.
