On February 12, 2019, seven immigrants representing a class of all detained immigrants in the New York City area, along with Brooklyn Defender Services (BDS), The Legal Aid Society (LAS), and The Bronx Defenders (BxD)—the three New York Immigrant Family Unity Project (NYIFUP) providers, as well as WilmerHale and Debevoise & Plimpton, filed a federal lawsuit in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York challenging US Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) refusal to bring immigrants to court for deportation hearings. Instead of letting detained immigrants appear in court, ICE has been forcing them to use a video connection to challenge their detention and deportation. This lawsuit seeks to restore the constitutional and statutory rights of hundreds of detained immigrants by ending ICE’s blanket use of video teleconferencing at Varick Street Immigration Court.
“Because of ICE’s refusal to bring our clients and other detained immigrants to court, hundreds of immigrants are unable to fully and fairly participate in their own hearings to decide their freedom, whether they can stay with their families or whether they will be deported to persecution or, even death,” said Andrea Saenz, attorney-in-charge of NYIFUP at Brooklyn Defender Services, “This policy is not just a small administrative change—it goes to the heart of whether our clients will get a fair day in court to contest their deportation. We, as a society, owe due process to people facing such enormous consequences—not to lock them up and show them a TV screen where they cannot properly hear the judge, speak to their lawyers or see their loved ones in-person.”
“We are proud to be part of this important lawsuit to vindicate the constitutional and statutory rights of detained immigrants in the New York area,” said Robert Gunther, a partner at WilmerHale. “ICE’s policy of refusing in-person hearings is wrong on every level and is just the latest effort on the part of the current administration to deny rights to those most in need of our compassion and our help.”
Along with Mr. Gunther, WilmerHale’s Christopher Bouchoux, Jeffrey Dennhardt, Will Kinder, Sam Callaghan, Johnny Castellanos and Cassie Mitchell are involved in this pro bono matter.
The full complaint is available, as is the NYIFUP's February 13 press release.