Arizona Jury Acquits CBP Agent Charged with Murder of Mexican Teenager - Reports

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - A US jury in the state of Arizona has acquitted a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agent of manslaughter charges related to the killing of a Mexican teenager in a cross-border shooting in 2012, media reported.

The jury found CBP agent Lonnie Swartz not guilty of murder charges in the death of 16-year-old Jose Antonio Elena Rodriguez in a cross-border shooting along the international border fence in Arizona, local newspaper Tucson News Now reported on Wednesday.

The media report noted that Swartz was acquitted in a trial earlier this year, but the jury was deadlocked on manslaughter charges.

In August, Senior Circuit Judge Andrew Kleinfeld said in a separate ruling that Swartz clearly violated a constitutional right and the victim’s mother may sue the agent.

The incident happened shortly before midnight on October 10, 2012, when Swartz was on duty on the US side of the southwestern border town of Nogales, Mexico, according to a court document.

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Elena Rodriguez was peacefully walking down a street in Nogales when without warning Swartz fired between 14 to 30 shots across the border at him, the document said. The teenager was killed as he was hit in the back with about ten bullets, it added.

The Mexican teen did not commit a crime or engage in any violent or threatening behavior against anyone, the court document noted.