Lawlessness.
***Article first published by 'IJR' on April 29, 2019***
Prosecutors in Massachusetts are not happy with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) enforcing immigration laws in their courtrooms, and they’re filing a lawsuit to make it stop.
The main responsibility of ICE is to enforce immigration laws in the interior of the United States, which includes courtrooms in Massachusetts. But as of late, prosecutors and judges in the state have been trying to keep agents away from illegal immigrants.
As IJR previously reported, Massachusetts Judge Shelley Joseph and her courtroom deputy were both charged with obstruction of justice after they coordinated with the defense team of an illegal immigrant to help him escape out a back door of the courtroom to evade ICE agents who were forced by Joseph to wait in the front lobby.
Now, state prosecutors are looking to ensure that ICE agents are never present in the courtroom because it makes illegal immigrants fearful of deportation.
According to a report from the Washington Times, prosecutors are suing to keep ICE out of the courtroom because it makes witnesses or victims who may be illegal immigrants uncomfortable.
Prosecutors wrote in the complaint filed against ICE:
Entire communities now view the Massachusetts courts as places where they cannot go, for any reason, greatly impeding access to justice and undermining the administration of justice in these communities.
A clear consensus has emerged in Massachusetts, and across the nation, among all stakeholders in the legal community that ICE’s civil-courthouse-arrest policy has resulted in a noticeable chill on court access, and as a result, on access to justice.
The complaint noted that courthouse arrests by ICE agents are on the rise in the U.S. — a statement that ICE doesn’t dispute. The agency claims the number of courthouse arrests has elevated because sanctuary city policies prevent other officers from making arrests, forcing ICE agents to resort to courtroom arrests.
Despite ICE’s efforts to minimize the impact of its law enforcement efforts, the adverse impact of sanctuary laws prevents them from doing so.
“In such instances [of a courtroom arrest], ICE officers and agents make every effort to take the person into custody in a secure area, out of public view, but this is not always possible,” the agency said in a statement to the Washington Times. “Further, when these arrests do occur, ICE makes every effort to ensure that the arrest occurs after the matter for which the alien was appearing in court has concluded.”
The lawsuit was signed by several Massachusetts prosecutors, the Committee for Public Counsel Services, and Lawyers for Civil Rights. It was formally filed on Monday.