The Northern Oregon Regional Correctional Center changed its policy last month, saying it no longer holds inmates facing local charges on U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainers, which call for undocumented immigrants to be held until federal agents can arrive to take them into custody.

The change means undocumented immigrants booked into the jail based in The Dalles will not continue to be held if their sentence is complete, have been released from custody by the court or posted bail.

"NORCOR does not accept or detain any individuals whose only violation of law is that they are persons of foreign citizenship present in the United States in violation of federal immigration laws," according to the jail's immigration and customs housing policy, which was updated April 2.

According to court records, a federal judge in Portland four days later ordered the dismissal of a lawsuit from Javier Esquivez Maldonado, 40, of Hood River, who said he was held at NORCOR for nearly 20 hours in July 2017 and turned over to ICE agents. He had gone to court earlier that month on a misdemeanor charge of first-degree criminal trespass and was ordered by a county circuit judge to report to the jail within a week and a half to be booked and released.

The jail didn't allow Esquivez Maldonado to leave as ordered, and ICE paid NORCOR $80 for holding him, the lawsuit said. ICE detainers call for inmates to be held for up to 48 hours.

[Read the lawsuit]

In a response to Esquivez Maldonado's lawsuit, NORCOR admitted that he was ordered by a judge to be booked and released, that jail staff received a detainer from ICE while he was being booked due to his immigration status, they held him as an "exclusive ICE prisoner" only because of the detainer and federal agents left with him the next morning.

[Read the response to the lawsuit]

It's not clear from the lawsuit or court documents what happened after Esquivez Maldonado was taken into federal custody.

The federal lawsuit was dismissed because of a settlement, court documents show. The jail agreed to pay Esquivez Maldonado $40,000, OPB reports. He was convicted of second-degree criminal trespass, a violation, in February and was ordered to pay a $300 fine, according to Oregon court records.

NORCOR's policy up to the recent change had been to notify ICE every time a person booked was born outside the U.S., passing along the person's name, date of birth, charges and place of birth to the federal agency. The jail cites Oregon law as the reason.

NORCOR, which houses inmates from Gilliam, Hood River, Sherman and Wasco counties, plans to continue holding inmates for ICE who face federal charges, have been sentenced and awaiting transportation to prison or are awaiting a hearing on their immigration status or deportation.

The jail received 105 detainers from ICE between November 2014 and October 2017, according to Willamette Week. The jail declined one detainer request during that time span.

Jails across the state stopped complying with ICE detainers after a U.S. District Court judge in Portland ruled in 2014 that a woman's Fourth Amendment rights were violated when she was held at the Clackamas County Jail for possible immigration law violations.

-- Everton Bailey Jr.

ebailey@oregonian.com

503-221-8343; @EvertonBailey