Attorneys for former Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan are renewing their push to overturn a federal jury’s guilty verdict, contending a recent ruling in a Virginia case supports their argument for dismissal.
Prosecutors fired back, urging U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman to reject the defense’s argument, saying the case cited is off-point and there are other cases that support Dugan’s conviction.
Adelman earlier rejected a broad appeal filed by Dugan’s powerful legal team, which sought to overturn a jury’s verdict that she obstructed federal immigration agents seeking to arrest a defendant appearing before her in court.
Adelman has given Dugan’s defense team until May 15 to respond to the government. Dugan’s sentencing is set for June 3.
Following the sentencing, Dugan’s team will appeal the case to the 7th Circuit of Appeals, her lawyers have said.
Overturned case key to defense argument
In their motion, Dugan’s attorneys note that a case cited by Adelman was overturned just 10 days after his order rejecting their appeal was issued.
At issue is a district court ruling in a Virginia immigration case, which was reversed by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals on April 16.
In that case, Dennis Hernandez, an undocumented immigrant, was taken into custody by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and later escaped. After he was recaptured, Hernandez was indicted for obstructing a pending immigration proceeding.
The district court in Virginia upheld the conviction, but the appeals court said the ICE action did not constitute a “pending proceeding,” which was required under the federal obstruction statute.
Similarly, Dugan’s attorneys argue, the former judge should not have been charged with obstruction here in Wisconsin because there wasn’t a “pending proceeding” against Eduardo Flores Ruiz, only a warrant filed for his arrest.
The defense said Adelman should enter an order of acquittal based on the 4th Circuit ruling.
In their response, prosecutors say the facts in the Hernandez case are different and don’t apply in the Dugan prosecution, adding that Adelman did not make the Hernandez ruling the “lynchpin” of his earlier findings.
Prosecutors also point to several other cases they say support their prosecution of the now-former judge.
Arrest in the Milwaukee County courthouse
Dugan was charged with trying to help Flores-Ruiz, an undocumented immigrant from Mexico, elude an ICE arrest team on April 18, 2025.
Flores-Ruiz was appearing before Dugan on misdemeanor battery charges. He had illegally re-entered the U.S. after being deported in 2013.
Dugan and another judge went into the public corridor, questioned the agents and directed them to the chief judge’s office. Dugan returned to her courtroom, called Flores-Ruiz’s case, and then led him and his lawyer into a hallway reserved for staff and jurors.
Flores-Ruiz was arrested outside after a short foot chase.
Dugan was found guilty of obstructing federal immigration agents and not guilty on a misdemeanor charge of concealing an undocumented immigrant agents were seeking to arrest.
Dugan, 67, resigned from the bench on Jan. 3, as an effort to impeach her and remove her from the bench was mounting within the Republican-controlled state Legislature.
A state judge for nine years, Dugan faces up to five years in prison, but it is unlikely she would get time behind bars. For a defendant like Dugan with no criminal history who is convicted of a nonviolent crime, federal sentencing guidelines generally call for probation.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Hannah Dugan’s team seeks to overturn jury verdict, prosecutors reject argument
Reporting by John Diedrich, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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