Judge Rules Elian Relatives Can Sue U.S.
From Associated Press
MIAMI -- A federal judge has ruled that Elian Gonzalez's Miami relatives
can sue the U.S. government for alleged use of
excessive force by federal agents during the raid to seize the Cuban boy.
U.S. District Judge Shelby Highsmith rejected a request from the government
to throw out the lawsuit, saying that the family has
"alleged sufficient facts to support such a claim."
No trial date has been set.
Lazaro Gonzalez, his wife, Angela Gonzalez, and daughter Marisleysis Gonzalez
contend that government officials violated their
constitutional rights when they ordered the April 22, 2000, raid to seize
the boy, then 6.
The Gonzalezes are seeking unspecified damages.
Elian and his father returned to Cuba last June after the Gonzalezes exhausted
all legal efforts to keep the boy in the United
States.
The judge cited a Chicago appellate ruling in a case in which a city police
officer with a search warrant allegedly broke down the
front door of a suspect's home without warning and pointed a gun at his
head.
U.S. Justice Department spokesman Charles Miller said the government has
not decided whether to appeal Highsmith's ruling.
In the ruling, filed Tuesday, the judge said then-Attorney General Janet
Reno and immigration chief Doris Meissner did not
conspire to violate the Gonzalezes' constitutional rights by ordering the
raid.
The judge also found that the government's arrest and search warrants used
to enter the Gonzalez family's Little Havana home
were legal.
However, "that is not a license for the government to exercise excessive
force in executing that warrant," the family's attorney,
Frank Quintero, said Thursday. "I think it's a very good ruling for us."
Copyright 2001