Federal Judge Sends Immigration Case Back to Wisconsin Supreme Court
ACLU of Wisconsin lawsuit challenges county sheriffs work with ICE.
The federal courthouse for the Western District of Wisconsin in Madison. John K. Wilson/WPR
A lawsuit challenging the authority of county sheriffs to work with federal immigration authorities is headed back to state court.
The case was filed last year by the ACLU of Wisconsin on behalf of the immigrants’ rights group Voces de la Frontera. It challenges what are known as immigration detainers, where U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, asks local jails to hold someone for up to 48 hours.
Detainers give immigration agents more time to pick someone up if that person is suspected of being in the country illegally. But the ACLU argues they don’t give jails the legal authority to keep holding someone after that person was supposed to be let out.
The ACLU filed its case as an original action petition with the Wisconsin Supreme Court, an expedited process that bypasses lower courts. The Wisconsin Supreme Court granted the petition in December, meaning justices agreed to hear the case.
Attorneys for sheriffs in Walworth, Brown, Marathon, Kenosha and Sauk counties tried to get the case moved to federal court, initiating that process in late December.
But in an order issued Friday, U.S. District Judge William Conley ruled that the process to move the case from state to federal court was initiated too late under state law. He said state law requires that step within 30 days.
“Because respondents waited to file their notice of removal some 103 days after service of the petition … and only after learning that the Wisconsin Supreme Court found the petition’s merits worthy of consideration — respondents’ notice of removal was untimely, and this case must be remanded to that court,” Conley wrote.
In an interview with WPR, Tim Muth, an attorney for the ACLU of Wisconsin, said the “detour” into federal court delayed the process of getting a ruling on this issue.
“And dozens, if not hundreds, of persons have been held on detainers in Wisconsin jails in that timeframe,” Muth said. “We hope for a speedy resolution of this case going forward.”
Liberals have a 4-3 majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. That will expand to 5-2 when Justice-elect Chris Taylor begins her term in August.
Federal judge sends immigration case back to Wisconsin Supreme Court was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
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