The mother of a migrant who was killed in a high-speed Otay Mesa car crash sued the federal government Thursday.
She alleges that a U.S. Border Patrol agent pursued the vehicle Jesus Atenco Perez was riding in, causing undue risk to him and other people on the roadway.
Atenco was one of two passengers killed when a vehicle driven by Chula Vista resident
Sergio Josue Palomera
crashed at high speed on state Route 905 on Oct. 22, 2024.
Federal prosecutors, who charged the driver in connection with the passengers’ deaths, said he was smuggling Perez, an undocumented immigrant, and a woman at the time.
A pursuit ensued after a Border Patrol agent attempted to pull thee car over. It crashed in the westbound lanes of state Route 905.
The woman was ejected from the car and died at the scene, while Atenco, 23, died later at a hospital. The driver
pleaded guilty
to transportation of certain aliens resulting in death and was sentenced this month to nearly six years in federal prison.
The wrongful death lawsuit filed by Perez’s mother states that a U.S. Border Patrol agent identified only as “D. Boone” initiated a “reckless pursuit” of the vehicle, which “contributed to the fatal collision.”
The complaint states the agent closely followed Palomera’s car at high speeds, “which further escalated the suspect’s erratic driving behavior” and that the chase “was conducted with reckless disregard for the safety of Jesus Atenco Perez, an unwilling backseat passenger who had no control over the driver’s actions.”
According to the lawsuit, the agent started pursuing the vehicle due to “a mismatched license plate … which did not involve an immediate threat to public safety or national security.”
Prosecutors alleged in sentencing documents from the criminal case that a car matching the one with Atenco in it had been spotted earlier that day at the Otay Mesa Port of Entry near a place where people had been scaling the border fence. Though its driver couldn’t be identified at the time, the car was able to elude a Border Patrol agent who attempted to stop it from leaving, but it crashed into the agent’s car in the process.
Just before the chase later that afternoon, the pursuing agent saw the car and noticed damage on the passenger side, which to him “indicated that it was likely the same vehicle that had eluded Border Patrol earlier that day.”
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Prosecutors said the agent terminated the pursuit after losing sight of the car, but Thursday’s lawsuit said the pursuit should have been called off after he witnessed the driver speeding and driving erratically. Prosecutors alleged data pulled from thee airbag sensor showed th vehicle reached speeds of over 110 mph.
The lawsuit states that CBP policy mandates pursuits be initiated “only when the need for immediate apprehension outweighs the risks to public safety,” such as when it involves a violent felony. The complaint also says CBP policies require pursuing agents “to maintain a safe distance to avoid pressuring the suspect into increasingly dangerous maneuvers.”
The lawsuit also faults CBP for failing to implement stricter protocols and training, because it alleges the agency was aware of at least three prior pursuits on state Route 905 that year that resulted in “collisions or near-misses.”
