LAS VEGAS (FOX5) – The American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada (ACLU) is seeking more information regarding a department policy shift related to immigration from the Las Vegas police, according to a lawsuit the organization says it filed Wednesday.
In a news release from the ACLU of Nevada, officials announced the legal action against the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD). The lawsuit claims that LVMPD officials failed to release public records regarding their cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The legal action claims that LVMPD quietly signed an agreement with ICE allowing local law enforcement to collaborate and carry out immigration enforcement duties. It also claims that the ACLU did not receive a response to public records requests regarding the policy shift.
Additionally, the lawsuit claims that the department expanded its “foreign-born” booking policy, broadening the list of charges requiring ICE notification. The change came in response to the January passage of the Laken Riley Act, according to the lawsuit. ACLU officials claim that the policy “could be used as a pretense to attack naturalized citizens and others.”
The lawsuit seeks to compel the LVMPD to disclose information regarding the policy shift under the Nevada Public Records Act (NPRAA).
In an interview with FOX5 in June, Kevin McMahill, sheriff of LVMPD addressed the policy, calling in “entirely jail-based.”
“When you walk in the door to our jail and you’re arrested for a certain offense and you’re foreign born, we make a notification to ICE,” McMahill said during the June interview. “I started to see that we were still having to let some very serious criminals out of our jail, that ICE wasn’t picking up.”
McMahill said he didn’t want some of those people being released in the community. “These are rapists, pedophiles, people that have beaten their spouse four or five times, DUIs that had been arrested four or five times.”
McMahill explained the agreement, which he said permits police to rebook suspects with an ICE warrant and hold them for up to 48 hours until federal officials arrive to pick them up.
Athar Haseebullah, executive director for ACLU of Nevada, called the agreement “legally questionable.”
“Nevadans have the right to know what their local police agencies are doing when it comes to cooperation with ICE,” Haseebullah said. “What is done in the dark will come to light, and we won’t be stonewalled. We will now pursue these records in court because Nevadans deserve government transparency.”
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