U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are now taking people into custody inside the Fairfax County courthouse, according to the Fairfax County Sheriff’s Department. It had been the practice for agents to identify people inside and make arrests outside but that changed earlier this month, with some people being detained before their criminal case hearings in local court.
One attorney who is raising concerns spoke to News4.
Pictures shared with News4 by witnesses appear to show ICE agents detaining multiple people inside the Fairfax County courthouse, which is new within the last couple of weeks, according to the Fairfax County Sheriff’s Office. News4 did not take these images. Witnesses shared them with us.
One of the people ICE detained was a client of Sarah Buskirk’s. She says her client was preparing for a preliminary hearing in a criminal case last Monday when ICE took them into custody.
“Within minutes of stepping into this conference room, the client’s family member knocked on the door and came in, frantic, saying the client had been taken,” Buskirk said.
In several of the pictures, a sheriff’s deputy is seen nearby as ICE agents appear to handcuff someone and take them out of the courthouse.
“It’s not their purview; it’s not their jurisdiction to arrest people for possible immigration problems, and yet they are actively helping,” Fairfax County Chief Public Defender Dawn Butorac said.
Butorac says she watched as sheriff’s deputies appeared to assist federal agents inside the courthouse last week.
News4 reached out to the Fairfax County Sheriff’s Office and asked specifically if deputies are assisting ICE inside the courthouse. In a statement, the Sheriff’s Office said the deputy is not assisting with any arrests or helping to track anyone down but they may stay in the vicinity of the agents in case there is a security issue.
The greater issue, attorneys believe, is these people are being taken into federal custody without due process.
News4 made contact with an ICE spokesperson to ask about these arrests inside the courthouse and what type of removal orders, if any, ICE is using. The agency never responded.
“I think that every single person in this country, no matter if you want people to be deported or not, should care about due process,” Butorac said. “Because when something happens to someone else, it can easily happen to you.”
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