The criminal case against four border-aid volunteers formally closed Monday in Tucson’s federal court.
The four volunteers with Tucson-based No More Deaths pleaded guilty to a civil infraction of entering a wildlife refuge without a permit and each paid $280 in fines. They had faced misdemeanor criminal charges connected to driving on the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in July 2017 in search of three people reported missing during a border-crossing attempt, according to records at U.S. District Court in Tucson.
A federal prosecutor clarified at a hearing Monday that the criminal charges were not “dropped” against the volunteers, as the humanitarian aid group claimed in a Feb. 21 news release.
“To the contrary, the defendants accepted a plea agreement whereby they accept responsibility for their illegal actions in exchange for a lesser charge,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Nathaniel Walters wrote in a motion to dismiss the criminal charges.
Caitlin Deighan was accused of driving in a wilderness area. She and Zoe Anderson, Logan Hollarsmith and Rebecca Grossman-Richeimer also faced charges of entering a wilderness area without a permit, according to a Dec. 6, 2017 charging document.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office did not enter into the plea agreement because it believed any of the defendants’ arguments “had any merit whatsoever,” Walters said.
One of those arguments was that No More Deaths organizers told volunteers that a federal prosecutor said his office was uninterested in prosecuting border-aid volunteers. Walters said the U.S. Attorney’s Office had no such policy.
No More Deaths and the public are “now on notice” that if anyone in charge of the group says volunteers can disregard federal law during border-related aid efforts, the volunteers should should first check with the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Walters said.
The lawyers representing the volunteers declined to make a statement to U.S. Magistrate Judge Bernardo P. Velasco.
Their clients declined to comment after the hearing, but long-time volunteer Geena Jackson said “criminalizing humanitarian aid is not going to stop civilians from responding to an obvious crisis of death and disappearance.”
In a news release Monday, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Elizabeth A. Strange said her office is “pleased that this matter was resolved through civil enforcement in which the defendants fully accepted responsibility for their illegal actions on a wilderness refuge specifically safeguarded by Congress.”
