Background
Since two thousand, the Kenosha County Jail has contracted with federal agencies to house aliens detained pending hearings or removal. The complaint alleges the jail requires these civil detainees to perform unpaid custodial work, such as sweeping floors and cleaning facilities. Detainees who refuse face discipline including loss of commissary privileges, loss of phone privileges, or solitary confinement for up to ten days. Three aliens filed suit under Section fifteen hundred and eighty-nine of Title eighteen of the United States Code, a criminal statute with a civil damages remedy. The district court dismissed the suit on the pleadings, ruling the statute applies only to human trafficking and cannot plausibly cover discipline during lawful custody.
The court’s reasoning
The court held that the statute must be read on its own terms rather than relying on the title of the larger enactment. The court found that the word whoever includes juridical persons such as counties, which are treated as persons under other federal civil rights statutes. The court concluded that threatening civil detainees with solitary confinement, a form of physical restraint, to coerce them into work violates the statute. The court distinguished this from work required of convicted felons, noting that the plaintiffs are civil detainees not subject to punishment.
What it means going forward
Public jails can no longer rely on sovereign immunity or narrow statutory definitions to avoid liability for forcing unpaid labor from civil immigration detainees under threat of physical restraint.
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