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A $4.64 billion punishment for a Mexican cartel’s bloodbath of American girls and kids was thought-about symbolic.
The households of the victims, who ranged from an 8-month-old child to a 43-year-old mother, had been by no means anticipated to see a dime.
However a regulation agency representing the households, Motley Rice Legislation Agency, inundated federal courts with over 1,200 claims in opposition to U.S. regulation enforcement-seized money and belongings throughout operations in opposition to Mexican drug traffickers, Bloomberg Legislation first reported.
Attorneys had been slowly making their method to fulfilling the $4.64 billion objective with particular person claims starting from a few thousand {dollars} to hundreds of thousands, however the federal prosecutor’s workplace in New York challenged the regulation agency’s authorized maneuvers.
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Clockwise from prime left: Dawna Langford, Trevor Langford, Rogan Langford, Christina Marie Langford Johnson, Kristal Miller, Rhonita Maria Miller, twins Titus and Tiana and Howard Miller. (GoFundMe)
Christina Marie Langford Johnson, 31, holding her 7-month-old child Religion, who miraculously survived the assault. ( )
The Juarez Cartel ambushed three moms and 14 kids, all U.S. residents, in a November 2019 blitz in Sierra Alta in Sonora, Mexico.
Cartel members blasted the People’ automobiles with lots of of rounds of ammunition.
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A mother and her 4 kids survived the barrage of bullets, however their automobile was deliberately torched, and all 5 victims died within the fireplace.
In whole, three girls and 6 kids died.
Individuals attend the funeral of Dawna Ray Langford, 43, and her sons Trevor, 11, and Rogan, 2, who had been killed by drug cartel gunmen, at a household cemetery in La Mora, Sonora state, Mexico, Nov. 7, 2019. (AP Picture/Marco Ugarte)
David Langford is consoled in the course of the funeral service for spouse Dawna Ray and their two sons in La Mora, Mexico, Nov. 7, 2019. (AP Picture/Christian Chavez)
A federal lawsuit was filed below the Anti-Terrorism Act on behalf of the victims’ households in North Dakota, the place a lot of the victims lived.
The decide finally awarded the plaintiffs $4.64 billion after a four-day bench trial in June 2022, based on court docket paperwork.
The “egregious bloodbath on Nov. 4, 2019, constituted an act of terrorism,” Motley Rice legal professionals wrote in a Feb. 9 court docket submitting in a New York case.
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Motley Rice filed over 1,200 circumstances in federal courts all through the nation to gather belongings and money seized throughout Mexican drug trafficking busts.
Most of the claims price a few hundred thousand {dollars} had been resolved and turned over.
A truck burns on a road in Culiacan, Sinaloa state, Jan. 5, 2023. Mexican safety forces captured Ovidio Guzmán, an alleged drug trafficker wished by america and one of many sons of former Sinaloa Cartel boss Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, in a predawn operation that set off gunfights and roadblocks throughout the western state’s capital. (AP Picture/Martin Urista)
However the Motley Agency hit a wall when it went after $6.25 million the feds seized throughout a significant 2021 cash laundering bust within the southern district of New York.
The top prosecutor, Damian Williams, argued in opposition court docket filings there isn’t any connection between the cash laundering scheme that federal brokers took down and the 2019 bloodbath.
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“The US holds a vested curiosity within the forfeiture belongings,” Williams wrote in a Feb. 15 response. Ruling in favor of the plaintiffs “might impair or impede the flexibility of america to guard its curiosity within the forfeiture belongings.”
The Southern District of New York prosecutor’s workplace moved to dismiss the forfeiture case, which was basically placed on pause till a better court docket makes a ruling.
The Motley Agency declined to remark till there is a determination.
Mexican marines escort 5 alleged drug traffickers of the Zeta drug cartel in entrance of an RPG-7 rocket launcher, hand grenades, weapons, cocaine and army uniforms seized from alleged members of the Zetas drug traffickers cartel and introduced to the press June 9, 2011, on the Navy Secretaryship in Mexico Metropolis. (Yuri Cortez/AFP through Getty Pictures)
WATCH: INTERVIEW WITH PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR: CARTEL KILLERS ‘CAN LOOK LIKE ANYONE’
The newest replace within the New York forfeiture case was filed Might 9, when the case was reassigned to U.S. District Court docket Decide Sidney Stein.
New York’s try and dismiss the case conflicts with a Feb. 23 determination in Ohio that awarded the victims’ households $9.93 million in belongings seized throughout a bust in June 2023, based on court docket paperwork.
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The federal judges’ competing choices may very well be Motley Agency’s big-picture recreation plan, College of Pennsylvania professor Louis Rulli instructed Bloomberg Legislation.
“Appellate courts which have checked out these points have dominated for the federal government, however the U.S. Supreme Court docket has not but spoken on the problems that Motley Rice current,” mentioned Rulli, whose specialty is forfeiture regulation.
Mexico’s “strongest and ruthless” cartel operates in all 50 states, the DEA says. (DEA’s 2024 Nationwide Drug Menace Evaluation)
Bloomberg Legislation additionally spoke to Stefan Cassella, a former federal prosecutor whose consulting agency focuses on asset forfeiture regulation.
Cassella instructed the outlet he sides with the New York federal prosecutor’s stance.
“It isn’t a chance for everyone to return in and say, ‘I don’t like that man, he owes me cash,'” Cassella mentioned.
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Each side are ready for Stein’s closing determination.
‘Symbolic’ $4.6B punishment in opposition to cartel that murdered People takes artistic authorized flip to turn out to be actuality
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