Wednesday, September 03, 2025

Boat cases

The defendants in those cases (usually mopes) used to get arrested, charged, and sentenced to monster sentences... And there has always been really interesting litigation surrounding jurisdiction and sentencing, etc.

But yesterday, the United States military blew up one of these drug boats, killing 11.  

Was this legal?

From Reuters:

The U.S. military killed 11 people on Tuesday in a strike on a vessel from Venezuela allegedly carrying illegal narcotics, President Donald Trump said, in the first known operation since his administration's recent deployment of warships to the southern Caribbean.
"We just, over the last few minutes, literally shot out a boat, a drug-carrying boat, a lot of drugs in that boat," Trump told reporters at the White House.
"And there's more where that came from. We have a lot of drugs pouring into our country, coming in for a long time ... These came out of Venezuela."
He later shared a video on his Truth Social platform that appeared to show footage from overhead drones of a speedboat at sea exploding and then on fire.
"The strike resulted in 11 terrorists killed in action. No U.S. Forces were harmed in this strike," Trump said.
He added that the U.S. military had identified the crew as members of Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, which the U.S. designated a terrorist group in February. He repeated allegations that Tren de Aragua is being controlled by Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro, accusations that Caracas denies.
 

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