"The lawsuit, shared in advance with the Guardian, says that Chad Joseph, 26, and Rishi Samaroo, 41, both of Las Cuevas, Trinidad, were returning to Trinidad from Venezuela when they and four other people were killed in the strike. It was the fifth attack announced by the White House under Donald Trump's campaign against the small go-fast boats the administration claims are connected to cartels and gangs."
"The death toll of the boat strikes stands around at least 117 people dead so far. The lawsuit said the strikes were illegal. These premeditated and intentional killings lack any plausible legal justification, the lawsuit said. Thus, they were simply murder, ordered at the highest levels of government and obeyed by military officers in the chain of command. Legal scholars have said the strikes, launched against civilians in boats far from the US, are violations of domestic and international law."
Civil rights attorneys filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Lenore Burnley and Sallycar Korasingh after Chad Joseph, 26, and Rishi Samaroo, 41, were killed in a US military airstrike on a small boat in the Caribbean Sea on 14 October. The suit asserts the strikes were illegal, calling the killings premeditated and murder ordered at the highest levels and carried out by military officers. The complaint was filed in federal district court in Massachusetts under admiralty law and cites the Alien Torts Act and the Death on the High Seas Act. The administration defends the strikes with a secret DOJ opinion claiming an armed conflict with cartels, while legal scholars say the strikes violate domestic and international law. Dozens of such attacks have been announced, with an estimated death toll of at least 117.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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