Washington Superior Court Judge Susan L. Clark has granted US Immigration and Customs and Enforcement's request to intervene in a case involving access to records relating to immigrant minors in the custody of a county juvenile facility under contract with ICE from 2015 to 2018.
University of Washington lawyer Angelina Godoy requested access to redacted copies of the records, "de-identifying" the juveniles, and local officials agreed to honor the request.
In a hearing conducted on November 21, ICE attorneys argued that the records access case "involved the property rights of the United States."
ICE maintains that the records were not "created" by the county or the juvenile facility but instead originated with ICE.
The next hearing in the case is scheduled for January 15.
In 2005, the Kentucky Attorney General affirmed a newspaper's request for access to a county detention center's booking photo of an adult federal prisoner housed in the county facility. Th attorney general rejected the US Marshal Service's argument that the photo could not be released without the US Marshal's approval.
https://ag.ky.gov/orom/2005/05ORD094.doc
But in 2017, the attorney general affirmed Lexington Fayette Urban County Government's denial of the ACLU's request for federal immigration detainers and related records under federal law.
