ICE and other agents conduct at least 12 recent arrests at courthouses. Experts warn some may stop showing up to court

By Taylor Galgano and Maria Aguilar Prieto, CNN

(CNN) — As the first day of his trial wrapped up and an eight-person jury was sworn in, the defendant stepped outside a Boston courthouse only to be immediately arrested by one of the prosecution’s witnesses — an ICE agent, his attorney tells CNN.

Wilson Martell-Lebron, who the government alleges is an undocumented immigrant from the Dominican Republic, was on trial in late March for using a fake name to apply for a driver’s license, according to his lead attorney, Murat Erkan.

Erkan described the shock as he watched his client get “abducted” by agents outside the courthouse, with his law firm eventually recognizing one of the agents as the witness from Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Wilson’s case.

“The people… in the street clothes start sprinting around the corner of the building. Nothing about their appearance suggests that they are law enforcement,” Erkan said. They weren’t wearing uniforms and were dressed “like the people that you would ride a bus with.”

As he watched his handcuffed client get put into a black SUV, Erkan was quickly piecing together what happened: his client had been arrested by ICE in the middle of his jury trial.

A senior Department of Homeland Security official said Wilson is a “criminal illegal alien” who had previous convictions for drug trafficking cocaine and heroin.

Wilson’s situation is not an isolated incident. Across the country, CNN has confirmed at least 12 ICE arrests on or near courthouse grounds since January. This was verified after reviewing statements and conducting interviews with local courthouses, attorneys, police, law enforcement, ICE and DHS.

Legal experts and immigration advocates CNN spoke to say these surprise arrests at courthouses disrupt judicial processes and make communities less safe, with some saying these actions may intimidate people from going to court hearings. And some immigration advocates told CNN they worry undocumented immigrants are changing their behaviors and could be avoiding houses of worship, their children’s schools and locations where they normally find work.

In several responses to CNN about specific instances of arrests at or near courthouses, the DHS defends ICE’s actions as tactical approaches to catching criminals and keeping the community safe. ICE also notes it asked local authorities to detain some undocumented people in certain cases before making a courthouse arrest. In one case in Philadelphia, ICE claimed its request was declined because the city considers itself a “sanctuary” city for immigrants.

Confirmed courthouse arrests in seven states

CNN has confirmed at least a dozen cases of people being arrested by ICE on or near courthouse grounds in Virginia, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and Wisconsin.

People arrested by ICE and federal agents at courthouses have a wide range of charges against them, ranging from misdemeanors to violent felonies.

As of January 21, ICE officers are allowed to conduct enforcement actions in or near courthouses when they have credible information that the targeted individual will be present and where local laws don’t prohibit such action from taking place, according to the ICE website. The guidance also stresses agents should carry out these arrests in non-public places and generally try to avoid family court and small claims courts when possible.

Wilson’s arrest in Boston on March 27 resulted in a legal back-and-forth over several weeks. In a rare move, the judge on the case, Mark Summerville, held ICE agent Brian Sullivan in contempt of the court for “knowingly and intentionally preventing the defendant’s appearance at an ongoing jury trial,” Suffolk County District Attorney Kevin Hayden said in a statement.

However, the district attorney’s office later found the judge lacked legal basis for the claim and the US District Court of the District of Massachusetts dismissed the charges against Sullivan. In a footnote on the district attorney’s memo, he also claims “all the parties were aware that ICE intended to arrest the defendant.”

Wilson was detained for weeks at the Plymouth County Correctional Facility and his attorney believes he was deported to the Dominican Republic.

The charges over whether Wilson used a different name when applying for a license were issued on January 23, 2020 – years before Massachusetts’ Work and Family Mobility Act went into effect, which allows residents to get a standard driver’s license regardless of their legal status.

Judge Summerville isn’t the only judge to get involved in one of ICE’s courthouse arrests this year.

Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan was arrested April 25 by the FBI and charged in federal court for allegedly helping an undocumented immigrant avoid arrest in a courthouse. On April 29, the Wisconsin Supreme Court suspended Dugan from practicing while the case plays out.

Mary Bauer, a civil rights lawyer and the executive director of the ACLU of Virginia, explains that a courthouse arrest has consequences far beyond a single case.

“The idea that we would not consider the kind of intimidation effect and the terrorizing effect of arresting people in this way is very concerning,” Bauer said. “Witnesses, victims of crime, people who simply want to pay a speeding ticket are going to be extremely reluctant to go into a courthouse if this is the risk that they face.”

The Immigrant Defense Project reported an increase in New York courthouse arrests during President Donald Trump’s first administration led to a drop in victims, witnesses and survivors using the state’s legal system.

The IDP recorded 11 ICE courthouse operations in 2016 compared to 172 operations in 2017 – a nearly 1,500% increase, with 202 operations in 2018. ICE’s tactics emboldened abusers and silenced victims those years, the report said.

For instance, one New York domestic violence nonprofit blamed ICE courthouse operations for fewer immigrants seeking legal assistance for gender-based violence. Sanctuary for Families closed 1,350 fewer cases and assisted 226 fewer clients seeking orders of protection from 2017 to 2018 – a trend it connected to ICE courthouse operations through conversations with current and prospective clients.

This year, immigration attorneys tell CNN they are already seeing a trend of fear about appearing in court as their clients learn of these arrests.

In Charlottesville, Virginia, some are anxious after video surfaced of an arrest inside the Albemarle County courthouse on April 22, according to Tanishka Cruz, an immigration attorney.

Videos verified by CNN show a chaotic scene where federal agents wearing plain clothes – with one wearing a balaclava mask – handcuff and escort 41-year-old Teodoro Dominguez Rodriguez into a vehicle. Charlottesville Public Defender Nicholas Reppucci confirmed his client is in the videos.

Rodriguez’s misdemeanor charge of assault and battery for a dispute with a roommate had just been dismissed by a judge moments before he was arrested in the courthouse, according to Reppucci.

CNN confirmed a separate charge of assault and battery against Rodriguez in a different case.

A senior ICE official said ICE stands behind the actions of the law enforcement officers and said Rodriguez, who is Honduran, had “multiple arrests for assault and battery as well as an outstanding order of protection against him.”

Local police confirmed the federal agents showed their badges and federal credentials to the bailiff before the arrest.

A couple who immigration lawyer Cruz represents had a routine custody proceeding the day after Rodriguez’s courthouse arrest and they were “terrified to show up” out of fear that ICE would arrest them too, she said.

“The only words of reassurance that I can give them is that this is a civil court. It’s not a criminal court. You know, we haven’t seen ICE coming to the juvenile court to make any arrests … But there’s never any guarantees,” she said.

Much like we are seeing now, this type of fear led to a lot of pushback during the first Trump administration, says Douglas Keith, a senior counsel in the Brennan Center’s Judiciary Program. This led to many policy changes at the state and local level restricting these types of arrests, he added.

For example, within a month of ICE changing its courthouse operation rules, one local court in Columbus, Ohio, has already implemented new rules preventing arrests in or near the courthouse without a judicial warrant.

“If what (ICE is) interested in is the criminal process, that’s the very thing that’s being interrupted by these arrests,” Keith said. “If they want the criminal legal system to play out, then disrupting judicial proceedings about those crimes is no way to do that.”

‘You could get detained if you go, you could get detained if you don’t go’

Related incidents also go beyond the courtroom, including people getting detained while attending routine immigration appointments.

Columbia University student Mohsen Mahdawi was released last week after getting detained by Homeland Security Investigations agents on April 14, according to court documents, while attending a naturalization appointment with US Citizenship and Immigration Services.

In a similar case, an Ohio man received a call from ICE informing him to go to the Blue Ash ICE field office on April 14 to get his ankle monitor removed. ICE routinely uses ankle monitors to track people in the US without legal immigration status.

Armando Leonel Reyes Rodriguez had been complying with regular border patrol check-ins through an app, according to his pastor Caleb Kragt, who drove him to his check-in that morning.

“He’s clearly hopeful to get his ankle monitor off,” Kragt tells CNN. “He doesn’t understand why he had it put on because he’s been complying with their monitoring the whole time. He wanted to believe that they would take it off because he is not a threat.”

Reyes Rodriguez never came out of the ICE office, Kragt said. Instead, he was arrested and brought to the Butler County Jail, where records show he is being held by ICE.

Kragt called the arrest “deceptive,” highlighting how Rodriguez was allegedly told to come in early to avoid a line.

Krishna Mahadevan, one of Reyes Rodriguez’s attorneys, said Reyes Rodriguez entered the US in 2021 with his partner and child after they witnessed “horrible crimes” in Honduras and were threatened not to report them. Since then, he has been under an order of supervision in the US as his partner and child seek asylum through a separate immigration case. The ankle monitor was put on Reyes Rodriguez about two months ago, Mahadevan said.

His attorneys have filed a request with ICE to pause his deportation while his partner and child’s immigration case plays out, Mahadevan said.

In a statement to CNN about Reyes Rodriguez, an ICE spokesperson said, “all aliens in violation of U.S. immigration law may be subject to arrest, detention and removal from the United States, regardless of nationality.”

Reyes Rodriguez was previously deported in 2005 and 2012, according to a senior DHS official.

Immigration attorney Cruz said many of her clients are scared to go to their check-in immigration appointments or choose not to go at all, especially her clients with children.

Last week, the US deported the Venezuelan parents of a 2-year-old and kept the toddler in government custody.

“It’s like a snake eating its own tail because you could get detained if you go, you could get detained if you don’t go,” Cruz said.

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