Leading anti-immigration vigilante ordered to pay $100,000 to victims

[Minnesota_Lib]

Border watcher ordered to pay nearly $100,000 for threatening hunters
Lawsuit resolution is a victory for immigrant rights groups trying to curb armed monitoring groups.

By Randal C. Archibold
THE NEW YORK TIMES
Friday, November 24, 2006

For years, Roger Barnett has holstered a pistol to his hip, tucked an assault rifle in his truck and set out over the scrub brush on his thousands of acres of ranchland near the border in southeastern Arizona to hunt.

Hunt illegal immigrants, that is, an act that's often chronicled by the news media. But now, after boasting of having captured 12,000 illegal crossers on land he owns or leases from the state and emerging as one of the earliest and most prominent of the self-appointed border watchers, Barnett finds himself the prey.

Immigrant rights groups have filed lawsuits accusing him of harassing and unlawfully imprisoning people he has confronted on his ranch. One suit pending in federal court accuses him, his wife and his brother of pointing guns at 16 illegal immigrants they intercepted, threatening them with dogs and kicking one woman in the group. Another suit, which accused Barnett of threatening two Mexican American hunters and three young children with an assault rifle and insulting them with racial epithets, ended Wednesday with a jury awarding the hunters $98,750 in damages.

But Barnett, known for dressing in military garb and caps with insignia resembling the U.S. Border Patrol's, is a special prize to the immigrant rights groups. He is ubiquitous on Web sites, mailings and brochures put out by border monitoring groups and, with family members, was an inspiration for efforts like the Minutemen civilian border patrols. "The Barnetts, probably more than any people in this country, are responsible for the vigilante movement as it now exists," said Mark Potok, legal director of the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks the groups. "They were the recipients of so much press coverage, and they kept boasting, and it was out of those boasts that the modern vigilante movement sprang up."

Jesus Romo Vejar, the lawyer for the hunting party, said their court victory Wednesday would serve notice that mistreating illegal immigrants would not pass unpunished. Although the hunters were not illegal immigrants, they contended that Barnett's treatment of them reflected his attitude and practices toward Latinos crossing his land, no matter what their legal status.
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Complete article at http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/nation/11/24/24immigsuit.html

:toast:

[ret5hd]

1. Put the bastard in our new repug designed bankruptcy courts!

I hope he has to pay for years.

[napingo]

2. It's unfortunate that our Gov't doesn't defend our border with Mexico.

If the U.S.Gov't did its job to enforce our own laws and if it provided adequate border protection, then people like these so-called hunters wouldn't exist.

For some reason, some of our own "liberal" friends either don't seem to grasp the damage to the middle and lower classes caused by OVERpopulation (a phenomenon exacerbated by coddling the wealthy interests that love having two million or more new customers each year who will also help drive down wages for everyone else, cause shortages in housing, and tax increases to pay for everything from police and fire protection and extra classrooms needed for all the new arrivistas).

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

3. Eeek! The Brown Bogeyman is gonna' getcha!

[Minnesota_Lib]

4. The "so-called hunters" that were harrassed at gunpoint were American citizens.

No one that I know of is in favor of unfettered illegal immigration.

Illegal immigration has been an issue for years and needs to be dealt with in a reasonable fashion. However, my problem is that it was only during the run-up to this last election that it was ramped up to be a hot-button, numero uno priority issue by the party of derisive politics. This was a thinly veiled attempt to fire up the racists in the Republican base.

Go to any poltically mixed forum that has an ongoing debate on the issue. The so-called "anti-immigration" arguements almost always eventually get stripped down to "they stink, they are messy, I hate them" and the term "illegal alien" ends up being dropped in favor of the noun "Mexican." The subject of coastal and Canadian border security is rarely breached and when it is, the focus quickly gets rerouted to the south. Links are provided to any crime story that has a suspect with a latin sounding name to prove "illegal Mexicans" (a ridiculous term I have seen often) are all criminals. It is typical bigoted nonsense.

So when I see a "so-called" vigilante acting out on his bigotry by threatening two American citizens who happen to be of Mexican heritage with a gun under the faux guise of border security, I have to cheer hardily the fact he is going to get a taste of justice.

[napingo]

5. On the larger, more important issue, I'm not sure what your point is, other

than "no one is in favor of unfettered illegal immigration". Not true (see my post #2). Furthermore, by talking about "illegal immigration", you are playing into the hands of some very smart people who control our politicians - and what will happen is simply a REdefinition of "illegal immigrant"...and the flood will continue unabated , but at least you'll have the satisfaction of knowing that "the bigots" didn't win.

[blogslut]

8. Maybe

If the US government actually fined and penalized the US businesses that hire these people, those immigrants would not be so keen to "invade" the country. Maybe if those same businesses weren't so cheap and paid American workers a living wage, there wouldn't be a problem.

[Mojorabbit]

6. They stink and are messy?

Tell that to my friends in construction who have been priced out of work by illegal aliens. I don't think so.
I totally disagree with what this racist vigilante did but I do think something needs to be done soon about our borders. I just am not intellingent enough to know what can be done that will work other than hitting empoyers who hire these people at slave wages in the pocketbook with huge fines.

[Telly Savalas]

7. If the U.S. government could magically seal the border

people like Roger Barnett would focus their sociopathic tendencies on other targets.

[mitchtv]

9. hAHAHAHAHA

bumped into some Chicanos who weren't about to be buffaloed. Got themselves a lawyer and sued the shit out of him. Time to mortgage those acres hahahahahahah:applause: :rofl: