Being Seized by Homeland Security and Border Control Agents
It used to be said, “If you were not doing anything wrong, what do you have to worry about?”
Today, just being on the street going home, to a store, walking to church, etc. is not guaranteed to being safe anymore. Authorities can target you, just because you look different than what they perceive a U.S citizen looks like. Be aware of where you are and who is around you. It not the malicious characters who are looking for a few bucks anymore. It is the uniforms.
One attorney’s story of being accosted. They obviously had a motive or reason. It focused on his phone.
Immigration Attorney Critical of ICE Receives Temporary Restraining Order Preventing Search of His Phone,
Above the Law
Last week, attorney Andrew Lattarulo was on his way home from Aruba when his iPhone 15 Pro Max was seized by Homeland Security and Border Control agents at Boston Logan International Airport. Perhaps un-coincidentally, Lattarulo is a well-known immigration in the Boston area — his clients include the father of a 4-month-old whose arrest by ICE drew public scrutiny — and has a popular social media presence that calls out problematic practices of immigration agents and is critical of Donald Trump’s policies.
As a result, he filed a lawsuit alleging violations of his First and Fourth Amendment rights. Lattarulo also filed an emergency motion seeking a temporary restraining order blocking the search of his phone and its return, as it contains confidential client information, as well as privileged information between himself and other attorneys. As stated in the motion, “The seizure was made eight hours after plaintiff had been inspected by United States Customs and Border Protection at a border crossing. Plaintiff’s phone was unlawfully seized and most likely searched in violation of plaintiff’s First and Fourth Amendments, and the constitutional rights of his clients.”
District of Massachusetts Judge Allison D. Burroughs granted the TRO, barring the government from searching the phone or analyzing any data that may have already been collected.
Lattarulo’s attorneys, Mary Lemay and Patrick Hanley from Butters Brazilian, said, “We believe attorney Lattarulo was targeted because he represents clients in immigration-related proceedings, and he has amplified the government’s own enforcement priorities via social media to immigrant communities and anyone else who might be interested.”
“Public criticism of our government is protected speech under the First Amendment. We initiated this suit to protect not only attorney Lattarulo’s constitutional rights, but also those of his clients.”
But this early success may not translate to ultimate victory. In 2021, Texas immigration attorney Adam A. Malik had his phone seized by border agents. The Fifth Circuit ruled DHS’s use of a filter team to sort out any privileged materials was sufficient to protect Malik’s clients, and that the government’s asserted connection between the attorney and an arms dealer created probable cause even if Malik is correct that the connection “appears dubious in hindsight.”
At the end of the day, law and your constitutional rights depend on at least a modicum of good faith including an effort to get the facts right. With SCOTUS being overtly partisan and intellectually dishonest–at least in a constitutional law sense–it is understandable and predictable that the more partisan lower court judges would follow suit. We are in a very bad place and John Roberts and Mitch McConnell have as much blame as a totally sycophant GOP and whoever is pulling the levers on a clearly compromised President.
Given the terror that ICE is causing in many communities, I was hoping some governors would activate their own national guard to fight them. Back in the 70s, the cop TV show Kojak was usually cops versus feds. It sounded ridiculous, but everyone loved Telly Savalas. We’ll see if life imitates art.
@Kaleberg,
Kojak was fiction.
Kaleberg:
One could always hope what they see on TV is reality or almost close to reality. Unfortunately, even though I know you do not preach such TV broadcasting can be real in life. One could almost hope.
The problem with many of the Feds? They live a lifetime away from the real life in cities and also rural communities or even farms. So what they apply what they think is a solution, it turns out not to be. Hence people complaints about big government.
The neighborhood police do not run around all decked out for war. Neither are their faces masked with scarves and helmets. The effect of all of this is to induce fear. And then they act out the role of being something left over from WWII. It is time to bring this to a screeching halt.