The family of a US tourist who died in Mexico last year under suspicious circumstances is demanding that President Biden and the State Department intervene in the death investigation.
Shanquella Robinson died while vacationing with friends in San Jose del Cabo, Mexico, in October 2022.
Shortly afterward, videos emerged of her being viciously beaten by other members of her party.
However, the FBI has declined to bring any charges in the case.
“We were hopeful that once the FBI got engaged, that they would respect this American citizen, this young black woman who, based on the video, did absolutely nothing to warrant such a savage beating,” civil rights attorney Ben Crump told reporters Friday morning in Washington, DC.
As shouts of “Justice for Shanquella Robinson” rang out among the crowd, Crump, surrounded by co-counsel, family and supporters, demanded “diplomatic intervention” in connection with the 25-year-old influencer’s death.
“But yet, here we are six months later and everybody who participated in the maiming and brutality of Shanquella Robinson is still completely free.”
Attorneys on Friday charged US law enforcement officials handled the case improperly because Robinson was a black woman, and compared the case to the thorough and extensive investigations into the deaths of Natalee Holloway and Gabby Petito.
Sickening cellphone video showed a woman viciously beating Robinson as an American-sounding man can be heard in the background shouting, “Can you at least fight back?”
An autopsy later revealed the North Carolina native died from “severe spinal cord injury and atlas luxation,” despite her friends’ claims she died from alcohol poisoning, Crump said.
“Imagine if this is your child, imagine if this is your daughter, who you bear, who you brought into this world. Just imagine that,” Crump went on.
US officials said last month they would not federally prosecute any of Robinson’s friends because investigators couldn’t prove a crime “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Mexican prosecutors have filed charges against one woman who was traveling with Robinson’s group at the time. But the woman, who remains unidentified, had previously returned to the US. Mexican authorities sought to have the woman extradited to Mexico.
Family and attorneys met Friday with Stephen Benjamin, director of the White House Office of Public Engagement, attorney Sue-Ann Robinson (who is not related to the family) told the crowd.
“They heard us and they’re hearing the family and they’re understanding that this is, it is a case that came from the people,” she said.
“The White House is starting to get the message that we’re not gonna stand down. We’re not gonna accept ‘No,’ we’re not gonna accept ‘Later,’ ‘Tomorrow,’ ’10 years from now.’”
