A Colorado federal judge determined Tuesday that immigration enforcement officers have disregarded his directive restricting arrests conducted without warrants.
U.S. District Senior Judge R. Brooke Jackson stated that Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel have ignored his November directive, which prohibited arrests without warrants unless officers had reasonable grounds to believe someone was unlawfully present and posed a flight risk before a warrant could be obtained. Jackson noted that since his ruling, ICE personnel have continued making arrests without warrants while failing to conduct “individualized, pre-arrest probable cause determinations of flight risk.”
The judge additionally mandated that immigration officers authorized to conduct warrantless arrests must complete training on court directives, and required the government to provide documentation of such arrests. This decision stems from litigation filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado regarding so-called incidental arrests of individuals unintentionally swept up during immigration operations.
The ACLU alleges that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been randomly detaining Latino individuals to fulfill enforcement quotas during President Donald Trump’s mass deportation initiatives while disregarding legal limitations on detention practices.
In his recent decision, Jackson determined ICE had insufficiently trained its deportation officers regarding his November court directive and is now mandating such education within 45 days.
He also determined ICE had “consistently failed” to meet documentation standards for warrantless arrests required under his court directive.
ICE, which has challenged Jackson’s November ruling, did not immediately provide comment regarding Tuesday’s decision.
“This is a profoundly important decision for the rule of law and the people of Colorado,” Tim Macdonald, legal director for the ACLU of Colorado, said in a statement. “The court made clear that ICE is not above the law and cannot continue to violate the law.”
During the past year, federal judges in Oregon, California and Washington, D.C., have similarly directed immigration officers in their jurisdictions to avoid conducting arrests without warrants unless flight risk exists.
Immigration officers typically obtain administrative warrants, which are documents issued by immigration agencies that authorize arrests, before searching for targeted individuals for arrest and deportation. The court cases focus on the detention of other undocumented individuals that officers encounter, including during searches for specific targets.
Such incidental arrests were prohibited during former President Joe Biden’s administration.
