Torture

Against the backdrop of a long history of trade union violence in Colombia, employees of the Colombian company Drummond organized a trade union. Shortly after, Drummond company entities and employees (“Drummond”) hired and paid paramilitaries from the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (a.k.a. AUC) to destroy the union and, in 2001, murder union leaders Valmore Locarno Rodriguez, Victor Hugo Orcasita Amaya, and Gustavo Soler Mora.

The children of Locarno, Orcasita, and Soler (the Children) brought suit in district court, alleging Drummond hired the AUC to assassinate their fathers in violation of the Alien Tort Statute (ATS), 28 U.S.C. § 1350, the Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991 (TVPA), 28 U.S.C. § 1350, and the wrongful death laws of Colombia, and that the murders caused the Children damages including emotional harm, loss of companionship, and financial support. The district court dismissed the complaint on res judicata and preclusion grounds and alternatively for lack of standing to sue under both the ATS and the TVPA.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reverses and remands on the res judicata issue and reverses on the issue of standing.

The key issue on appeal is the Children’s standing to sue under the TVPA. After affirmatively answering the threshold question whether the Children satisfied the Constitutional requirement of “Case or Controversy” for standing, the Appeals Court addresses whether the TVPA provides a cause of action in this case. The Court lays out all the requirements for obtaining relief pursuant to the TVPA: i.e., the plaintiff must be “(1) a legal representative or any person who may be a claimant in an action for wrongful death; (2) of a victim of an extrajudicial killing; (3) committed by an individual acting ‘under actual or apparent authority, or color of law, of any foreign nation.’” [1346] After holding that plaintiffs satisfied the second and third prongs, the Court focuses on the first, stating: “The Parties’ dispute centers upon whether the Children are proper ‘claimant[s] in an action for wrongful death’ as that phrase is used in the TVPA.” [1347] The Court notes that “Congress did not explicitly define, nor is it apparent from the face of the TVPA, how a court should properly ascertain who is a ‘claimant in an action for wrongful death.’ Neither can we discern from the statute itself whether Congress intended state law or federal law to supply the meaning of ‘claimant in an action...