ICE agrees to court rules on detainees in Yuba County

Immigrations and Customs Enforcement must maintain court-imposed measures to contain a COVID-19 outbreak at a county jail north of Sacramento that houses immigrant detainees as the agency chose Monday not to oppose a federal judge's intervention in the case.

U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria converted into a preliminary injunction the temporary restraining order he had issued in December.

ACLU of Northern California attorney William S. Freeman said ICE's "nonopposition is entirely appropriate."

"It's been clear to us for a long time now that ICE will not act on its own to protect the health and safety of detainees -- that it will only do the least amount possible and only when it's forced to do so by a judge," he said.

ICE and the Department of Justice did not respond to requests for comment.

Chhabria required more stringent safety measures be implemented at Yuba County jail. They included the suspension of intake, ordering rapid tests to be administered to all detainees with symptoms and a mandate that everyone be tested weekly until there are no positive results for two weeks.

Department of Justice attorney Sara Winslow wrote in a court filing that ICE does not object to the issuance of a preliminary injunction requiring it to maintain the measures for the duration of the outbreak, which will be considered over when there are no new positive tests among staff and detainees for two consecutive weeks. She denied that ICE acted with "deliberate indifference" in containing the virus. The judge's order followed an outbreak at the facility in which roughly a third of 231 detainees tested positive in December.

The jail is operating at slightly less than 50% capacity. It separates detainees by those who test negative with no symptoms, those who test negative and have symptoms, those who test positive and those who test positive and have recovered.

ICE partners with Yuba county to house immigrants awaiting deportation. Rivas v. Jennings, 20-cv-02731 (N.D. Cal., filed April 20, 2020).

Plaintiffs' attorney Emilou MacLean of the San Francisco Public Defender's Office, which also represents the detainees, maintained that those jailed at the facility remain unsafe.