After two inmates sued the sheriff of El Paso County for detaining people longer than state law allowed at the request of immigration authorities, the Court of Appeals on Thursday dismissed the case because new legislation rendered the issue moot.

Sheriff Bill Elder detained individuals at the El Paso County jail following detainer requests and administrative warrants from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Such tools enable law enforcement to hold a suspect for up to 48 hours beyond their normal release because ICE believes they are in the country unlawfully. 

Because the detainers and administrative warrants are not signed by judges, they are not mandates. Elder’s policy was to comply with the ICE requests, originally detaining them indefinitely. He revised the policy down to 48 hours, but continued to detain inmates who posted bond or completed a sentence.

Saul Cisneros and Rut Noemi Chavez Rodriguez sued the sheriff over this practice. In Cisneros’s case, Elder detained him for four months after he posted bond. District Court Judge Eric Bentley decided that Elder violated the state constitution’s protections against unreasonable seizures and the rights to bail and due process. Bentley extended relief to all inmates in the “ICE Hold Class” and “Bond Class” who were the subject of immigration detainers.

Elder appealed, but in the interim, Gov. Jared Polis signed House Bill 1124 in 2019, which prevents local law enforcement from detentions based on ICE requests. The three-judge panel of the court of appeals agreed that the issue was moot and vacated the district court decision, even though Elder argued against doing so.

Elder also disputed some of the facts established at the district court level, but Judge Michael H. Berger pointedly rebuffed the sheriff’s concerns, saying the panel “need not address whether a party may stipulate to facts in the district court and then, when inconvenient, disavow them in this court.”

The case is Cisneros et al. v. Elder.