“What we intend to do (is) to help serve this community, and that is to file a $27 billion civil rights lawsuit under our United States Constitution, one-of-a-kind in the whole world,” California attorney Charles Bonner told KSAT in announcing the lawsuit.
He then listed off Uvalde ISD, its police chief Pete Arredondo, the Uvalde Police Department, the Uvalde County Sheriff, the Texas Rangers, the Department of Public Safety (DPS), and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol as the law enforcement subjects of the impending suit.
Bonner also aims to name in the suit gun manufacturer Daniel Defense, whose gun the shooter purchased and used, and Outback Oasis, the store at which the firearm was bought. He even floated the Uvalde ISD school board and the city council as potential defendants.
The lawsuit is still being drafted, but as a class action, plaintiffs may be added as the case develops. Bonner intends to file the suit next month, after the U.S. Department of Justice concludes its own investigation into the tragedy.
The case’s argument, as Bonner explained, centers on the 14th Amendment and the right to life. “People have a right to life under the 14th Amendment and what we’ve seen here is that the law enforcement agencies have shown a deliberate conscious disregard of the life,” he said.
Others joining Bonner are a Uvalde law firm and Everytown, an organization founded after the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting, which calls for increased gun control measures.
Earlier this year, a lawsuit brought by Sandy Hook parents reached a $73 million settlement with gun manufacturer Remington, opening the door for similar suits.
The fallout from the shooting has resulted in accusations of negligence being lobbed back and forth between state and local law enforcement. DPS Director Steven McCraw called the local law enforcement’s response an “abject failure.” Lawmakers released a report last month on the shooting, which “found systemic failures and egregiously poor decision making.”
###
Disclosure: Unlike almost every other media outlet, The Texan is not beholden to any special interests, does not apply for any type of state or federal funding, and relies exclusively on its readers for financial support. If you’d like to become one of the people we’re financially accountable to, click here to subscribe.
Brad Johnson
Brad Johnson is a senior reporter for The Texan and an Ohio native who graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 2017. He is an avid sports fan who most enjoys watching his favorite teams continue their title drought throughout his cognizant lifetime. In his free time, you may find Brad quoting Monty Python productions and trying to calculate the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow.