Texas set to release migrants held in violation of state law after delay

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Three days after a state district judge ordered the immediate release of more than 240 imprisoned migrants for violating state law, the Texas prison system finally received the papers on Friday to release the men from custody on free bonds.

Prison officials expect the men arrested on Governor Greg Abbott’s initiative to be turned over to federal immigration services to either be arrested again, deported, or released to the U.S. pending asylum hearings. They still face government prosecution in their trespassing cases.

Defense lawyers and prison officials said US immigration and customs officers routinely detain men released from Abbott’s “catch and jail” border enforcement efforts when they are convicted of trespassing criminal charges. ICE also arrests those who have been released from state prisons despite still being charged.

“If they were convicted and served their sentence, they would be turned over to ICE,” said Bryan Collier, executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, at a hearing this week. “They will also be handed over to ICE when they make bail.”

That week, hundreds of detained migrants were released all on personal bonds that do not require cash upfront as they have been detained for weeks without criminal charges. Texas law states that criminal defendants must be released from prison on affordable or personal bail if prosecutors delay cases by not bringing charges quickly. For trespassing, the charge on which the vast majority of migrants are arrested, this period is 15 or 30 days depending on the count.

On Tuesday, Republican Judge Roland Andrade ordered 75 migrants who had been detained for more than 15 days after being arrested and charged with trespassing in the Val Verde district, home of Del Rio, to be released immediately as the District Attorney had not yet filed a criminal complaint had filed against them. More than 30 days earlier, 168 migrants were arrested in Kinney County, a neighboring rural region.

District officials said their local justice systems were overwhelmed with a sudden influx of hundreds of arrests by state police, causing delays in law enforcement. Jennifer Laurin, a law professor who teaches criminal law and procedure at the University of Texas at Austin, said state law ordering release for delays in prosecution is intended to protect the right to expeditious trial.

“It is not uncommon for the state to simply not be ready and for the accused to be released,” she said. “The unusual thing about this case is the mass character.”

The men’s release was further delayed as defense attorneys and prosecutors representing Kinney County negotiated the migrants’ release, defense lawyers said. On Friday morning, three days after his verdict, Andrade received the agreed release warrants, signed them and handed them over to the Texas prison system, he said.

On Friday afternoon, a TDCJ spokesman said the prisons had received the bond release papers and began working with ICE, whose staff in the two prisons were recently converted to state immigration prisons as part of Abbott’s border policy.

In July, angry with federal government policies and a surge in border crossings that year, Abbott ordered state police to arrest and detain migrants suspected of having crossed the border illegally, mostly for the offense of the Entering private property. Since then, more than 1,000 men have been arrested and detained, almost exclusively in Val Verde and Kinney counties, according to the Texas Department of Public Security. As of Thursday, more than 900 of the migrants had been detained.

Abbott has repeatedly commended DPS for keeping the border safe with ongoing trespassing arrests. But the initiative has been fraught with missteps from the start, including unlawful family segregation, the release of arrested migrants at a bus stop in the border town, and dozens of men detained for weeks without legal counsel.

For the men due to be released this week, their fate in ICE custody may differ from what they would have experienced if they had been arrested at the border by the U.S. Border Protection Agency. As part of a federal policy banning entry into the country during the pandemic, many migrants arrested by border guards after entering Texas are being deported immediately. Texas RioGrande Legal Aid, a defense group that represents hundreds of arrested migrants, said their clients, who were detained by the state and then turned over to ICE, were often released to the US while waiting for asylum applications.

“Once on the ICE, many clients were released at their own discretion, some were released on immigration bonds, and some were imprisoned,” said Robert Elder, a spokesman for the TRLA.

The TRLA plans to continue filing legal petitions to request the release of more migrants as they will remain in jail after the 15 and 30 day periods.

Kinney County attorneys on Tuesday also agreed to dismiss charges against two men after their attorneys argued against the legality of Abbott’s new initiative as a whole. In some cases, defense lawyers argued that police were wrongly selective in their trespassing arrests by arresting only men who were almost exclusively Hispanic. A TDCJ spokesman said her discharge papers weren’t received until Friday morning either.

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