Here are two stories about the same incident.
Can anyone shed more light on this?
Here is another Article:
Can anyone shed more light on this?
Earlier this year two illegal aliens from Central America were
apprehended while trespassing on a U.S. citizen's property. The U.S.
citizen then, they admitted in court, provided them with food,
refreshments and a blanket before sending them on their way.
Shortly thereafter the foreign national lawbreakers retained the
services of a U.S. attorney and sued the U.S. property owner in a U.S.
court, accusing him of having beaten them as well as of having used
racial slurs against them. A French journalist who was filiming a
documentary about U.S. border issues at the time, and who had
witnessed the entire incident firsthand, emphatically denied that the
American had done any of the harmful things attributed to him by the
illegal aliens.
Nonetheless, the U.S. court then awarded the U.S. citizen's entire
70-acre ranch to the illegal aliens as compensation for the illegal
aliens' claim that the American had given them "post-traumatic stress"
because they thought he was going to kill them rather than give them
cookies, drinks and warm blankets as they admitted he had actually
done. (Even wealthy U.S. real estate tycoons, still jubilant after the
Supreme Court's ruling in Kelo vs. New London, Connecticut that ok'd
seizing ordinary Americans' land and ancestral homes even if only to
build a minimall, could only dream of being able to get away with such
a land grab versus American citizens as the illegal alien foreign
nationals did in this case.)
Here is another Article:
DOUGLAS, Ariz., Aug. 18—Spent shells litter the ground at what is left of the firing range, and camouflage outfits still hang in a storeroom. Just a few months ago, this ranch was known as Camp Thunderbird, the headquarters of a paramilitary group that promised to use force to keep illegal immigrants from sneaking across the border with Mexico.
Now, in a turnabout, the 70-acre property about two miles from the border is being given to two immigrants whom the group caught trying to enter the United States illegally.
The land transfer is being made to satisfy judgments in a lawsuit in which the immigrants had said that Casey Nethercott, the owner of the ranch and a former leader of the vigilante group Ranch Rescue, had harmed them.
“Certainly it’s poetic justice that these undocumented workers own this land,” said Morris S. Dees Jr., co-founder and chief trial counsel of the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Ala., which represented the immigrants in their lawsuit.
Mr. Dees said the loss of the ranch would “send a pretty important message to those who come to the border to use violence.”
The surrender of the ranch comes as the governors of Arizona and New Mexico have declared a state of emergency because of the influx of illegal immigrants and related crime along the border.
Bill Dore, a Douglas resident briefly affiliated with Ranch Rescue who is still active in the border-patrolling Minuteman Project, called the land transfer “ridiculous.”
“The illegals are coming over here,” Mr. Dore said. “They are getting the American property. Hell, I’d come over, too. Get some American property, make some money from the gringos.”
{snip}
Mr. Mancía, who lives in Los Angeles, and Ms. Leiva, who lives in the Dallas area, have applied for visas that are available to immigrants who are the victims of certain crimes and who cooperate with the authorities, Ms. Bruner said. She said that until a decision was made on their applications, they could stay and work in the United States on a year-to-year basis.
Mr. Mancía and Ms. Leiva were caught on a ranch in Hebbronville, Tex., in March 2003 by Mr. Nethercott and other members of Ranch Rescue. The two immigrants later accused Mr. Nethercott of threatening them and of hitting Mr. Mancía with a pistol, charges that Mr. Nethercott denied. The immigrants also said the group gave them cookies, water and a blanket and let them go after an hour or so.
The Salvadorans testified against Mr. Nethercott when he was tried by Texas prosecutors. The jury deadlocked on a charge of pistol-whipping but convicted Mr. Nethercott, who had previously served time in California for assault, of gun possession, which is illegal for a felon. He is now serving a five-year sentence in a Texas prison.
Mr. Mancía and Ms. Leiva also filed a lawsuit against Mr. Nethercott; Jack Foote, the founder of Ranch Rescue; and the owner of the Hebbronville ranch, Joe Sutton. The immigrants said the ordeal, in which they feared that they would be killed by the men they thought were soldiers, had left them with post-traumatic stress.
Mr. Sutton settled for $100,000. Mr. Nethercott and Mr. Foote did not defend themselves, so the judge issued default judgments of $850,000 against Mr. Nethercott and $500,000 against Mr. Foote.
Mr. Dees said Mr. Foote appeared to have no substantial assets, but Mr. Nethercott had the ranch. Shortly after the judgment, Mr. Nethercott gave the land to his sister, Robin Albitz, of Prescott, Ariz. The Southern Poverty Law Center sued the siblings, saying the transfer was fraudulent and was meant to avoid the judgment.
