Your feedback ensures we stay focused on the facts that matter to you most—take our survey.

Miranda-Olivares v. Clackamas County, Oregon

From Ballotpedia
Jump to: navigation, search
FederalCourtsPortalMastheadImage.png


Miranda-Olivares v. Clackamas County, Oregon is a case that was decided in the United States District Court for the District of Oregon on April 11, 2014. Magistrate Judge Janice Stewart delivered the opinion of the court.[1]

Judge Stewart held that Clackamas County's detention of a foreign national based on an U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainer form violated the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.[1]

Case background

On March 14, 2012, Maria Miranda-Olivares was arrested for violating a domestic violence restraining order in the state of Oregon, and was subsequently booked into the Clackamas County jail. At the time, county policy stated that when a foreign national was brought to the jail on a warrant or on probable cause, the county should notify U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), an agency of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).[1]

On March 15, 2012, ICE issued an immigration detainer to the county, a request instructing the county to detain Miranda-Olivares while ICE initiated an investigation into whether Miranda-Olivares was subject to removal from the United States. According to depositions presented during hearings, "when the Jail receives an ICE detainer, it holds the person subject to the detainer for up to 48 hours, not including Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays, beyond the time when the person would otherwise be released, even if the person posts bail ... The Jail's practice is the same whether or not the ICE detainer is accompanied by an arrest warrant, statement of probable cause, or removal or deportation order."[1]

On the same day that ICE issued the detainer, Miranda-Olivares was arraigned and charged with two counts of contempt of court for violating the restraining order. The arraignment judge set bail at $5,000.00; Miranda-Olivares was required to pay $500.00 in order to post bail. However, under the county's policy, the jail "holds an individual who is subject to an ICE detainer in custody, even if the underlying state criminal charges are resolved or bail is posted."[1] Between March 16 and March 30, 2012, the jail informed both Miranda-Olivares and her sister that she would not be released even if she were able to post bail because of the ICE detainer. Based on that information, she did not post bail. Later, Miranda-Olivares testified that she became aware of the detainer on the day it was issued, but she was never provided a copy, which violated the detainer's instructions.[1]

On March 29, 2012, Miranda-Olivares pleaded guilty to one count of contempt of court. She was sentenced to 48 hours in jail, with credit for time served, and was also sentenced to a period of probation. Given her incarceration, Miranda-Olivares would have been freed upon entry of her plea, but the jail held Miranda-Olivares for an additional 19 hours pursuant to the ICE detainer, after which she was released into DHS custody. At no point in her incarceration did Miranda-Olivares petition for habeas corpus, file a grievance, or petition DHS or ICE regarding the detainer.[1]


Outcome

On April 11, 2014, Magistrate Judge Janice Stewart of the United States District Court for the District of Oregon decided the case, ruling that Clackamas County's detention of a foreign national based on an U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainer form violated the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.[1]

Miranda-Olivares' claims

Maria Miranda-Olivares presented three claims in support of her argument that her incarceration was unconstitutional:[1]

  1. The county violated 42 U.S.C. §1983 - Civil action for deprivation of rights by depriving her of liberty without due process in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Amendment XIV, United States Constitution;
  2. The county, in violating 42 U.S.C. §1983, also deprived her of her right to be free from unreasonable seizure, which is protected under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution; and
  3. The county falsely imprisoned Miranda-Olivares, a violation of state law.

The county petitioned for summary judgment on all of Miranda-Olivares' claims. Miranda-Olivares filed a cross motion for partial summary judgment on both of her §1983 claims against the county. Judge Stewart, in an opinion and order filed on April 11, 2014, granted summary judgment to the county on claims 1 and 3, but granted summary judgment in favor of Miranda-Olivares on claim 2.[1]

§1983 claims - ICE detainer

Judge Stewart held that the ICE detainer did not compel the county to detain Miranda-Olivares because under (8 CFR §287.70) the detainer "does not mandate detention by local law enforcement, but only requests compliance in detaining suspected aliens ... any injury Miranda-Olivares suffered was the direct result of the County exercising its custom and practice to hold her beyond the date she was eligible for release based solely on the ICE detainer. The County argues that it had no choice because the ICE detainer mandated her detention pursuant to 8 CFR §287.7 ... however .... no federal circuit court 'has ever described ICE detainers as anything but requests.'"[1]

Accordingly, Judge Stewart did not accept the county's argument that the ICE detainer compelled the county to detain Miranda-Olivares. In Judge Stewart's words, "...the Jail was at liberty to refuse ICE's request to detain Miranda-Olivares if that detention violated her constitutional rights. Accordingly, the County cannot avail itself of the defense that its practice and custom did not cause the allegedly unlawful detention."[1]

Fourteenth Amendment claim (Claim 1)

After holding that the county's policy was the proximate cause of Miranda-Olivares' injury, Judge Stewart addressed the three claims for which the county sought summary judgment. In assessing Claim 1—that Miranda-Olivares' incarceration violated her rights of liberty under the Due Process Clause of the Amendment XIV, United States Constitution—Judge Stewart granted summary judgment in favor of the county.[1]

Claim 1 alleged a violation of Miranda-Olivares' rights of substantive due process. Under a precedent of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the supervising circuit for the District of Oregon, "substantive due process refers to certain actions that the government may not engage in, no matter how many procedural safeguards it employs."[1] In order to prove a substantive due process violation in the Ninth Circuit, a plaintiff must show:[1]

  1. A government deprivation of life, liberty, or property exists, and
  2. The challenged government action was "clearly arbitrary and unreasonable, having no substantial relation to the public health, safety, morals, or general welfare."

Though Judge Stewart found that Miranda-Olivares "easily satisfied" the threshold burden of a government deprivation of liberty in this case, Stewart held that "government action taken as the result of 'reasonable, though possible erroneous, legal interpretation' does not rise to the level of egregious conduct ... Even though the County's interpretation is wrong, it is not necessarily unreasonable."[1]

Fourth Amendment claim (Claim 2)

Judge Stewart next turned to the question of whether Miranda-Olivares' detention violated the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The county raised two arguments in support of justifying Miranda-Olivares' detention. First, the county argued that Miranda-Olivares lost protection under the Fourth Amendment after her arraignment on the state charges on March 15, 2012, because her detention pursuant to the arraignment was legal from that time forward. Judge Stewart, however, rejected that argument on the grounds that had either bail been posted or her state charges been resolved, the county would have lacked probable cause to hold Miranda-Olivares. As such, "the continued detention exceeded the scope of the Jail's lawful authority over the released detainee, constituted a new arrest, and must be analyzed under the Fourth Amendment."

The county also argued that Miranda-Olivares was never effectively released and that, under the Fourth Amendment, "a seizure can only occur after a person is physically released from custody and taken back into custody." Judge Stewart found that the county lacked probable cause to detain Miranda-Olivares. In her words,[1]

“ Miranda-Olivares was not charged with a federal crime and was not subject to a warrant for arrest or order of removal or deportation by ICE. The County admits that Miranda-Olivares was held past the time she could have posted bail and after her state charges were resolved based exclusively on the ICE detainer. But the ICE detainer alone did not demonstrate probable cause to hold Miranda-Olivares. It stated only that an investigation 'has been initiated' to determine whether she was subject to removal from the United States ... The ICE detainer’s stated purpose of requesting the Jail to hold Miranda-Olivares custody was 'to provide adequate time for [ICE] to assume custody' of her. Therefore, it was not reasonable for the Jail to believe it had probable cause to detain Miranda-Olivares based on the box checked on the ICE detainer. There is no genuine dispute of material fact that the County maintains a custom or practice in violation of the Fourth Amendment to detain individuals over whom the County no longer has legal authority based only on an ICE detainer which provides no probable cause for detention. That custom and practice violated Miranda-Olivares’s Fourth Amendment rights by detaining her without probable cause both after she was eligible for pre-trial release upon posting bail and after her release from state charges.[2] ”

Based on this reasoning, Judge Stewart granted summary judgment in favor of Miranda-Olivares on Claim 2.[1]

False Imprisonment claim (Claim 3)

Judge Stewart granted summary judgment in favor of the county on Claim 3. While acknowledging that Miranda-Olivares' detention was illegal and violated the Fourth Amendment, Judge Stewart noted that the Oregon Tort Claims Act provided immunity for state agents from claims rising under state law if the illegal actions were not conducted in either bad faith or with malice. In Judge Stewart's opinion, "there is no contention or evidence that the County was acting in bad faith or with malice."[1]

Impact

In the week following the ruling, sheriff's offices in nine Oregon counties announced that they would no longer fulfill ICE detainer requests without a court order or warrant:[3][4]

Gilliam County Sheriff Gary Bettencourt said, "We will no longer violate anybody’s constitutional rights, I can guarantee that." Bettencourt, who was also the president of the Oregon State Sheriffs' Association, also said that it was likely more counties in Oregon would follow suit.[3][4]

Although, according to Portland immigration attorney Stephen Manning, the opinion was not binding outside of Clackamas County, Juliet Stumpf, a professor at Lewis and Clark Law College in Oregon, speculated that it could have an impact across the country. "It opens potential liability for counties all over the country for following ICE's requests," Stumpf said.[3]

See also

External links

Footnotes

  1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 United States District Court for the District of Oregon, Portland Division, United States District Court for the District of Oregon, Portland Division, decided April 11, 2014
  2. ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 The New York Times, "Sheriffs Limit Detention of Immigrants," April 18, 2014
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 The Oregonian, "Immigration detainer changes spreading across Oregon; national implications possible," April 17, 2014
Retrieved from "https://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=Miranda-Olivares_v._Clackamas_County,_Oregon&oldid=10430995"