Bill DeMora is currently serving his first term as a state senator.
Imagine going to court over a speeding ticket and ending up in a jail cell hundreds of miles from home for months. That is exactly what happened to Leonardo Fausto, who has been detained by ICE since last June and is currently detained in an ICE facility in Michigan.
Fausto is in the country legally. He has no criminal history. He did his civic duty and showed up to Franklin County Municipal Court on a routine matter. The federal agents needed to fill their arrest quotas, and when they saw a brown man, they kidnapped him without a legal basis.
Nearly a year ago, the Franklin County Common Pleas Court recognized the threat of warrantless arrest and passed two rules, Local Rules 111 and 112, which prohibited warrantless civil arrests in the courthouse and barred judicial warrants from being executed inside courtrooms. Fausto’s abduction is case in point.
The justice system is jeopardized
When people are summoned to court for any reason, it is crucial that they attend.
The justice system is jeopardized when individuals are too afraid to participate in their legal hearings due to fear of being apprehended by authorities.
Witnesses may be reluctant to testify, victims may hesitate to come forward, and defendants could miss hearings and face failure-to-appear warrants. If someone does not appear in court out of fear of deportation, it reflects a flaw in the system meant to protect them. The Franklin County Municipal Court, apparently, does not see it that way.
The Common Pleas Court acted quickly and decisively. Our municipal court has done nothing.
This is particularly frustrating because the need for these protections is even greater at the municipal level, where most cases involve not criminal charges, but civil disputes, environmental violations and traffic matters.
These are people who owe a fine, not people who pose any threat to anyone.
Many of them are immigrants with legal status or citizens who have done nothing wrong beyond a parking ticket or a zoning issue. They should not have to weigh their legal obligations against the risk of being taken from their family.
Leonardo Fausto’s abduction should be wake up call
In August, following Fausto’s abduction, the Public Defender’s Union issued a formal statement condemning ICE activity in the courthouse.
The statement called on the municipal court to adopt protections like those already in place at common pleas. To this day, no new rules or regulations have been adopted.
The municipal court’s inaction is a betrayal of the oath every judge took to uphold justice.
A courthouse should be neutral ground, a place where people come to resolve disputes and fulfill their legal obligations. The court is not a place where anyone should have to gamble with their freedom just by walking through the door.
Allowing federal agents to treat it as a hunting ground undermines the entire purpose of the institution and erodes the public trust that courts depend on to function.
I am calling on the Franklin County Municipal Court to immediately adopt rules prohibiting ICE from making arrests within the courthouse so the court’s daily operations are protected and everyone with legitimate business can participate without fear. And I want a straight answer: Why have these rules not been drafted already, and who inside that court is standing in the way?
Voters in Franklin County will remember the municipal court’s complete lack of action.
Bill DeMora is currently serving his first term as a state senator. He represents the 25th Senate District, which encompasses parts of Franklin County.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: I demand Franklin County judges stop letting ICE use courts as hunting grounds | Opinion
Reporting by Bill DeMora, Guest Columnist / The Columbus Dispatch
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