Undocumented Immigrant Sues Daly City For Allegedly Violating Ca Values Act

SAN FRANCISCO (BCN)

An undocumented Salvadoran immigrant has sued Daly City and its Police Department in federal court in San Francisco for allegedly wrongfully turning him over to federal immigration agents in violation of a state sanctuary law.

Jose Armando Escobar-Lopez, 22, of El Sobrante, filed the lawsuit on March 12. He was pulled over in his car and arrested by two Daly City officers on May 11, 2019, and transferred to the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

After nearly three months in custody, he was released by ICE while he contests a deportation order issued by an immigration judge in New Jersey in 2017.

The lawsuit alleges the city violated the California Values Act, also known as a sanctuary law, enacted as Senate Bill 54 in 2017. The measure prohibits local law enforcement agencies from spending resources on investigating, detaining or arresting people for purposes of federal immigration enforcement.

The lawsuit asks for financial compensation for Escobar-Lopez and an injunction requiring Daly City to comply with the law and to further revise its policy on immigration enforcement.

Angela Chan, an Asian Law Caucus attorney representing Escobar-Lopez, said, "We hope to send a message to local police and sheriff's departments that those violating SB 54 will be held accountable."

A representative of the City Attorney's Office of Daly City was not immediately available for comment.

After Escobar-Lopez's arrest was publicized last year, Daly City officials said it was an isolated incident and said "there is no pattern or practice that shows that the Daly City Police Department directly or indirectly enforces immigration law."

The city also revised its immigration enforcement policy in August. The lawsuit claims the revision was inadequate and not given sufficient public review.

Escobar-Lopez fled from violence in El Salvador and entered the United States at the Texas border at age 17 in 2015 and hopes to apply for asylum if his deportation proceeding is reopened, Chan said.

The officers who arrested him last year learned from a database that Escobar-Lopez was subject to a civil administrative warrant in the deportation case. But the lawsuit says there was no indication that he was violating any criminal law, and SB 54 specifically forbids "making or intentionally participating in arrests based on civil immigration warrants."

The filing of the lawsuit follows the city's rejection in September of an administration claim Escobar-Lopez filed in July. Chan said a number of other administrative claims for alleged violations of SB 54 have been filed against local governments in the state, but said she believes this case is the first to proceed to a lawsuit.

The other claims are pending or have been settled, she said.

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