For more than 30 years, victims of human rights abuses could file federal suits against individuals and corporations that harmed them, no matter where the violations occurred.

All of that changed on April 17, when the U.S. Supreme Court issued its opinion in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum. The court’s decision radically alters decades of jurisprudence, and closes our courtroom doors to most human rights victims who have nowhere else to turn, and who cannot seek justice in their home countries.