The Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office says it won’t change its immigration policy following a new state law that bans parishes and municipalities from adopting so-called “sanctuary city” policies.
The longstanding OPSO policy bars the agency from investigating immigration violations and detaining immigrants for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement without a court order, except in certain cases where they are facing charges for a small number of serious violent crimes. The measures were adopted as part of a federal court settlement over a 2011 case in which two men said they were illegally held in the city’s jail for months at ICE’s request.
But as a new bill aiming to expand the role of local and state police in immigration enforcement made its way through the Louisiana Legislature this spring, some immigrant advocates were concerned the legislation would come into conflict with federal court orders restricting OPSO and the New Orleans Police Department from directly participating in such enforcement.
The measure, which went into effect after Gov. Jeff Landry signed it late last month, essentially states that law enforcement entities in Louisiana cannot block officers from notifying federal immigration agencies when they have an immigrant that is suspected to be eligible for removal in their custody. Agencies must comply with requests from federal agencies like U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to detain someone until they can be taken into federal custody.
Although the bill does not have specific language exempting agencies under federal judgments, lawmakers backing the bill have said they’re not trying to interfere with the federally mandated policies in Orleans Parish. So OPSO is sticking with its current policy and taking lawmakers “for their word,” said Will Harrell, who oversees the agency’s policy directives.
“We at the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office intend to continue functioning the same way we always have under these consent [orders],” said Harrell, a longtime jail watchdog. “Our consent decree does permit us to execute ICE detainers in limited circumstances. We’ll continue to do that.”
The sheriff’s office is also under a consent decree in a separate federal case that bans the jail from detaining people at ICE’s request for more than 48 hours after they have been released from state criminal charges or bailed out.
Earlier this month, Sheriff Susan Hutson also met with members of the immigrants rights community, including one of the lead plaintiffs in the 2011 lawsuit, to discuss her office’s approach to immigration enforcement in light of the new law, Harrell said.
“They just wanted to hear from her,” Harrell said in a phone interview. “And she reassured them that she’s going to comply with the consent orders and has no intention of doing anything to the contrary.”
Those attending the meeting discussed opportunities for community engagement as well as efforts to educate jail staff and people held at the jail on cultural differences and immigrants’ rights, Harrell said.
Adopted in 2016, NOPD’s immigration policy was also developed under a yearslong federal consent decree. It specifically bars officers from taking law enforcement actions based on “actual or perceived immigration status” or questioning crime victims or witnesses about their immigration status.
NOPD has not publicly said how it will square the new law with existing policy.
“NOPD is currently reviewing and revising policies to ensure compliance with both State law and the Consent Decree,” said NOPD spokesperson Karen Boudrie in an emailed statement. “As such, we cannot speak to any further action in this regard at this time.”
Stella Cziment, New Orleans Independent Police Monitor, said that the federal consent decree would “effectively trump” the state law: “When there’s a clash or conflict of laws, federal law is going to reign supreme.”
The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Blake Miguez, R-New Iberia, has maintained that the law does not clash with existing consent decrees.
“Nothing in this bill requires cities to take on the enforcement of federal immigration laws or investigate immigration status,” Miguez said in a committee hearing when the bill was first introduced. “Victims and witnesses of crimes will not be reported to the federal immigration officials. This bill only applies to those illegal immigrants who commit crimes.”
Though earlier versions of the bill would have allowed the governor to withhold funding from agencies that didn’t comply with the law, that language was ultimately stripped from the legislation. But the law as passed does include language stating that the state attorney general can file suit against noncompliant agencies.
Attorney General Liz Murrill’s office did not immediately respond to questions from Verite News on how the state plans to enforce the law by publication time.
Potential harms
Still, immigrants’ rights advocates say they are concerned broadly with the potential harms of the new law across the state.
Jail operators outside of Orleans Parish “stand to lose” if they are required to execute ICE detainers, said Mary Yanik, an attorney and co-director of the Immigrants’ Rights Law Clinic at Tulane University, because they shoulder the costs and could be exposed to litigation.
“The jails pay for housing, they risk lawsuits, they don’t get reimbursed by either ICE or the state government,” Yanik said. “…The state law does not protect police or jails from being sued for violating someone’s constitutional rights.”
Miguez, the bill’s sponsor, emphasized during the legislative session that Senate Bill 208 was aimed to hold immigrants who commit violent crimes accountable, though the law doesn’t have language that limits enforcement actions to suspects accused of violent crimes.
Some advocates say the law could ensnare other immigrants who end up interacting with local law enforcement.
Rachel Taber from Union Migrante, an immigrants rights advocacy group based in New Orleans, said immigrants arrested for minor infractions by local police outside of Orleans Parish can face overly punitive consequences, as they can become eligible for deportation after entering the criminal legal system for minor infractions.
“What we have in most parishes across Louisiana is what I like to call ‘traffic court with a death sentence,’” Taber said. “You could end up being permanently separated from your U.S.-born kids, in a country where you fear for your life over a misdemeanor that a Louisianan would get probation for.”
The new law says state and local law enforcement agencies are not required to report the immigration information about a victim of or witness to a crime “if the victim or witness … responds to the entity or agency’s request for information and cooperation.”
Despite this carve-out, Taber said the law will still have a chilling effect on whether immigrants contact law enforcement when they are victims of or witnesses to crimes.
“If people start to see their loved ones being arrested and separated from their children, they’re gonna learn really quickly what the police are about,” Taber said.