Pistols are put up for sale at a gun convention in Las Vegas, United States, last August. John Locher (AP)
Mexico and US arms manufacturers have come face to face for the first time in a Massachusetts court.
The litigants from both parties have presented their oral arguments for the judge to decide whether the lawsuit filed by the Mexican government last year will be admitted to trial or not.
It has been a key day.
Based on what was said at the hearing on Tuesday and the arguments given in writing in the last ten months, the course of the legal battle will be defined and whether the arms companies will sit in the dock or not.
However, that decision is expected to be announced in the coming weeks.
Mexico claims that half a million weapons cross the border illegally each year and puts the damage from the violence at two percentage points of GDP.
The compensation demanded by the Mexican litigants is in the order of 10,000 million dollars under the argument that the armories are not only aware of the traffic to the country, but also negligently encourage it with advertising campaigns and products specially designed to attract to criminal groups.
Among the eight companies sued are some of the market leaders in so-called small arms such as Beretta, Smith & Wesson, Colt and Glock.
Practically seven out of ten illegal weapons in the Latin American country are produced by these companies.
The manufacturers respond that there is not enough evidence to hold them responsible for the improper use of their weapons, that the case does not fall within the jurisdiction of Massachusetts - one of the States that is not aligned to the US pro-weapons belt and where many are based - and that they are shielded from any lawsuit by the Law for the Protection of the Legal Arms Trade (PLCAA), a statute that gives them legal immunity in US territory promoted by the George W. Bush Administration.
The same day that the case reaches a defining date, there has been a shooting in Brooklyn that has left 16 injured.
The court has to decide just that, whether a foreign country can sue US arms producers for damages perpetrated abroad, in this case Mexico.
Judge Dennis Saylor's questions have gone in this direction, whether it is correct for Italy to sue the armories in the United States for the mafia's crimes in Sicily or if the decision to admit this lawsuit will result in other countries seeking similar trials in the American courts.
In addition to the metaphor of the Italian mafia, the judge referred to other hypothetical examples such as Israel and the Palestinian militias or even Russia and the resistance troops in Ukraine.
“If the Ukrainians are using American-made military weapons or a Smith & Wesson revolver to defend themselves,
The legal team representing Mexico has replied that these are not hypothetical cases and that the illegal trade and the commercial practices that support it are real.
"They know that the criminals are buying their weapons," said Jonathan Lowy, one of the lawyers, during a session that lasted an hour and a half.
"They could stop [this trafficking] and they choose of their own free will to be blind to these facts," added Lowy.
"The circumstances of this litigation are specific to Mexico," said Alejandro Celorio, the legal consultant for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
A key argument of the Mexican side is that the immunity enjoyed by the arms industry, one of the most powerful in the United States, does not apply because the damages were committed outside of United States territory and because the PLCAA statute does not explicitly state in its text that the shielding of armories against any demand also applies abroad.
For Andrew Lelling, the representative of Smith & Wesson, the argument is "absurd" and has defended that the weapons were legally sold in the United States.
The strategy of the defendant companies has been on several fronts.
Each company has filed separate responses to fragment Mexico's legal team and force it to respond one by one to each armory's arguments.
There were eight individual motions to dismiss the case and one as a whole.
They have also argued that they cannot be blamed for the "incompetence" of the Mexican government in dealing with the crisis of violence plaguing the country.
In January and February of this year alone, more than 2,800 investigations have been initiated in Mexico for homicide with firearms, despite the fact that in the country there is only one store for the purchase of legal weapons, run by the Army.
It's not just homicidal violence: More than 1,300 people have reported gunshot injuries in the first two months of the year, according to official figures.
The Mexican government has sought allies in the United States to counteract the political weight of the arms industry.
Twenty states, including Democrats California and New York, have backed the lawsuit, as well as 25 US district attorneys.
He has also taken his crusade against gun violence to the UN and has partnered with
think tanks
and civil society organizations on both sides of the border.
Faced with the permanent demand of the White House to curb drug trafficking, it is the first time that the Mexican authorities have brought the demand for weapons to the bilateral negotiating table.
The manufacturers have said the litigation is a way to go around diplomatic and political channels where, in their opinion, it should blow off steam.
But Mexico maintains that it must receive the same equal treatment that any plaintiff receives before the law.
Sources from the Mexican Foreign Ministry have said that they had budgeted for the judge to be harsh in demanding that the litigation be justified, even more than with the defendants, but they are confident and say they are ready to appeal in case the ruling is not favorable. .
In the scenario that the process stalls in Massachusetts, they say, it does not mean that it is the end of the legal case.
"Violence cannot be resolved with more violence," Celorio said, speaking about the importance of the dispute.
"The responsibility of companies has never been questioned," he added.
In a matter of weeks, although without a defined deadline, it will be known if the Mexican litigants will be able to have "their day in court" in the United States.
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