More than 240 migrants granted release
Many held weeks without charges, breaching Texas law
More than 240 migrants arrested under Gov. Greg Abbott’s border security initiative are set to be released from state-run lockups after local prosecutors, overwhelmed by an influx of detained migrants, failed to bring charges as they sat in cells for weeks, an apparent violation of state law.
Texas National Guard troops and state police have been mobilized by the hundreds to help round up and jail migrants caught crossing the border under Abbott’s plan, known as Operation Lone Star. The plan broadly expands the state’s role in immigration enforcement, which is typically left to the federal government, though Abbott has argued his new approach is necessary to handle a steep increase in border crossings since President Joe Biden took office.
Roughly 1,000 migrants have been arrested so far, mostly on state trespassing charges in Kinney
and Val Verde counties, with hundreds imprisoned for weeks and some held for longer than a month without a judge seeing basic documents outlining the charges against them. As of Monday, more than 800 migrants, most from Mexico and Honduras, were being held at two state facilities, a state prison official told lawmakers at a committee hearing.
State law requires defendants to be released on cashless bonds or have their bail reduced “if the state is not ready for trial” within certain timeframes. For most trespassing cases, prosecutors must file charges within 15 days, though attorneys from Kinney County have argued Abbott’s disaster declaration along parts of the border gives them 30 days.
At a hearing Tuesday, State District Judge Roland Andrade granted the release of 168 migrants who had been jailed in Kinney County for at least 30 days, along with 75 migrants detained in Val Verde County for longer than 15 days.
County prosecutors had agreed to release the migrants ahead of Tuesday’s hearing, according to their attorney.
Kate Huddleston, an attorney with the ACLU of Texas, said state officials have essentially tried to create a “parallel criminal enforcement system” for migrants arrested under Operation Lone Star, but without any safeguards for when local prosecutors decide not to prioritize migrants’ cases or to prevent them from becoming overwhelmed by the volume of arrests.
“What the state is trying to do is put together this slapdash system in which people are processed in a new way under emergency authorizations and, in doing so, the state has not been careful to ensure that individuals’ rights are protected,” Huddleston said.
The judge’s order comes as Abbott has made the border his top issue ahead of his re-election campaign and received $1.8 billion from the Legislature to build a physical barrier along parts of the border and continue arresting and incarcerating the migrants.
State lawmakers also provided funding for the network of courts and detention facilities that are tasked with processing and detaining the arrested migrants, setting aside more than $32 million for the Office of Court Administration to hire new visiting judges, public defenders, court interpreters and other court staff.
The border spending bill also set aside $100 million in grant funds, administered by Abbott’s office, to help local authorities enforce Operation Lone Star, including various court costs. Abbott announced last week that counties could begin applying for the funds, though Maria Elena “Mena” Ramón, interim administrative director for the Office of Court Administration, said Monday grant funds had yet to be distributed to counties.
Ramón said “resources and funding are clearly needed” to help Kinney and Val Verde counties handle the flood of cases. She cited the uptick in Kinney, where there have been an estimated 800 arrests under Abbott’s border initiative over the last month. Over the last year, just 16 misdemeanor cases were filed in the county, Ramón said.
Abbott did not respond immediately to a request for comment.
The incarcerations began in late July.
Tuesday’s hearing was in Del Rio, where Abbott made an appearance just last week to blast Biden and highlight how state troopers lined up hundreds of squad cars along an international bridge to help keep out Haitian refugees who had amassed there.
Andrade ordered the migrants released on cashless personal bonds.
The migrants’ attorney, Kristin Etter of the nonprofit Texas RioGrande Legal Aid, also argued that state law requires people detained while awaiting trial to be held in the county where they were arrested, unless the local jail is deemed unsafe. The migrants were being held in state prisons in Frio and Hidalgo counties, outside the counties where they were arrested and prosecuted.
In a court filing last week, Etter wrote that “transporting pretrial detainees hours away from the county of arrest and prosecution where the evidence is located, and hours away from people able to provide help, to a prison facility, is not only unauthorized by Texas law without specific judicial authorization, but also violates several important constitutional rights guaranteed to those merely charged with criminal offenses who are unable to post bail.”
Bryan Collier, executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, told a House committee Monday that migrants jailed under Abbott’s initiative are typically picked up by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement authorities upon being released. They can then be deported or released into the country to await immigration hearings.