ICE prowls Marin

Sherman R. Frederick

Marinscope

The County of Marin held its annual “TRUTH ACT” meeting last week. It didn’t go without finger pointing. 

The act  requires the county to hold a local forum on the level of cooperation between the Marin County’s Sheriff’s office and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. 

The meeting started with a presentation from Sheriff Robert Doyle, followed by Canal Alliance representative Lucia Martel-Dow. It centered primarily on how the Sheriff’s Department interacts with ICE regarding people arrested. 

Sheriff Doyle told the group that his office interacts with ICE when ICE sends them a 247 form on illegal immigrants in the sheriff’s custody. In 2019, he said 171 of those forms were received and only 27 inmates were subsequently picked up by ICE. Those individuals, he said, were charged or convicted with the most serious crimes and had been arrested over 100 times in Marin for suspected criminal activity. 

Otherwise, Doyle said, his department does not cooperate with ICE. 

Canal Alliance’s Martel-Dow, however, dropped a bombshell at the meeting when she produced pictures of what she said was an undocumented immigrant being handcuffed presumably by ICE outside the sheriff’s office the day before the meeting, in front of his awaiting family.

“He was released from the county jail,” and then picked up by a plain clothes officer and put into an unmarked van. 

“Is this what we want to see in Marin,” she asked. 

Supervisors expressed disgust about the pick-up and Damon Connolly asked the sheriff how this could happen. 

The sheriff told Connolly it happens because he and his fellow supervisors ended so-called “warm handoffs” with ICE. 

The sheriff said he didn’t know any of the details of this particular arrest, but called it “appalling and shocking” and rejected hints during the meeting that his department is in any way cooperating with ICE other than to receiving 247 forms. 

Arrests made in Marin, he explained, are entered into a database that is shared with all law-enforcement agencies, including ICE. At that point, the sheriff doesn’t know who is in the country illegally and his officers do not ask any immigration-related questions. It is only when ICE sends the sheriff a 247 form that the jail is alerted to a possible immigration issue. But even then, the sheriff only turns over inmates who have serious criminal charges or convictions. He again reiterated that last year ICE sent the jail 171 requests for prisoners via the 247 form. The sheriff only turned over 27 of those requested inmates. Those 27, he said, were arrested over 100 times for alleged crimes in Marin.

The others are released when it’s time to release them. If ICE wants them, they have to pick them up through other means. Sometimes, ICE is waiting for the inmate outside the jail. That’s a result of the Supervisor policy as of August of this year, the sheriff said.

But the meeting ended on an upbeat note.

Supervisor Judy Arnold described the situation as a “glass half full.” When Joe Biden comes into office, she said, “I think we won’t be having this angst.” There’s reason to hope.” 

Several supervisors also praised support for the cooperation between the sheriff and the Canal Alliance. 

ICE Out of Marin (IOOM), however, a coalition of social justice and immigration reform activists, boycotted the meeting. In a ​letter to the board​, IOOM co-chair Lisa Bennett said:

 “We will not participate in a process or event which results in no accountability. We have no confidence that the participation of ICE Out of Marin in the TRUTH Act Forum will do anything except offer the board an opportunity to present their agenda as if there had been community input.”

“This decision was made in solidarity with Canal residents,” she said, adding “who decided that more hours of heartfelt and quite frankly brave testimony, will be more performative than effective, part of an event which will not result in the change they seek.”

(During the pandemic, you can reach Sherman Frederick at shermfrederick@gmail.com.