The following article was originally published in the Ohio Capital Journal and published on News5Cleveland.com under a content-sharing agreement.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio is suing the Geauga County Sheriff’s office over its refusal to provide copies of contracts it’s signed with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Geauga is one of at least five counties in Ohio that have signed contracts to house migrants detained by ICE on the belief that they’re undocumented.
RELATED: 57 people in custody after ICE raids in Northeast Ohio; feds not talking
The ACLU on Tuesday afternoon filed a writ in the Ohio Supreme Court asking the court to mandate the release of the contracts. In a statement, the civil liberties group said that in April the sheriff’s office claimed that releasing the records was “‘prohibited by federal law’ and therefore not public per the Ohio Revised Code. (The ACLU) was instructed to instead contact ICE for the records.”
Under such contracts, the federal government pays counties to house detainees. During the first Trump administration, the Ohio counties that housed detainees faced complaints and lawsuits.
The ACLU’s statement said that the office didn’t cite a valid reason not to release its ICE contract.
“None of the federal statutes (the county’s lawyers) have cited, however, prohibit the disclosure of the requested records,” the writ said. “Because (the county’s lawyers) have refused to perform their clearly defined duty to provide the requested records, (the ACLU) respectfully submits this complaint for alternative and peremptory writs of mandamus to require (the sheriff’s office) to provide her with the records she seeks.”
Geauga County Chief Sheriff’s Deputy Thomas Rowan said the county’s attorneys are telling a different story — that only ICE can release the documents.
“It’s in our attorneys’ hands,” he said. “Once the court rules, we’ll definitively know which way to go. Our attorneys believe that they have to go through ICE to get copies of any of the paperwork.”
As a general matter, government documents can usually only be withheld or redacted if they contain sensitive personal information, business secrets, or if their disclosure would endanger public safety or national security.
A wave of state and national public records laws were passed in the wake of the Watergate scandal to crack down on government corruption. Documents relating to the expenditure of government dollars were a particular target of such laws.
As Trump promises mass deportations, the ACLU said it would try to keep a close watch.
“The ACLU of Ohio is deeply committed to protecting immigrants’ rights and our organization serves as a watchdog for government transparency and accountability,” Jocelyn Rosnick, Chief Policy and Advocacy Officer, said in a written statement. “We know that Geauga County Jail has housed ICE detainees for years, some of whom we have previously defended in court. Our lawful demands for timely and accurate information must not be ignored.”
