A federal court in California has approved a settlement that bars Immigration and Customs Enforcement and immigration judges from setting bonds without considering a detainee’s ability to pay.
The settlement is the result of a class action lawsuit filed in 2016 by the ACLU and a group of pro-bono lawyers. It alleged the U.S. government had failed to consider an individual’s financial means when setting bond amounts.
One of the plaintiffs, a Honduran man named Cesar Matias who fled persecution in his home country over his sexual orientation. He was arrested by ICE in 2012 and spent four years in a California jail because couldn’t afford to pay the $3,000 cash bail to get out while his asylum application was being considered. He had come to the U.S. after fleeing persecution in his home country over his sexual orientation.
The new settlement mandates ICE and judges consider whether a bond amount is financially out of reach for the person detained. It also mandates they consider alternative conditions for release if a person can’t pay.
Michael Kaufman, an ACLU lawyer who worked on the case, said while the settlement technically applies to people detained in the Los Angeles area, the stipulations it lays out are expected to apply in all states under the jurisdiction of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, including Arizona. It is slated to take effect next Friday.
