New Haven Independent

The 15 — out 31 or 32 undocumented immigrants arrested in the sweep last week (there’s still some confusion on the total number arrested — appeared in federal immigration court in Hartford for a bond hearing. They shuffled in, one at a time, in handcuffs and leg irons, with chains around their waists, to appear before Judge Gary Malphrus.

Malphrus denied the request to lower the bond, for now. The 15 spend another week in various jails around New England before coming back to court on June 20.

Attorney Mike Wishnie (pictured at the top of this story) of the Yale legal clinic, representing the defendants, asked the judge to lower the bonds — set at $15,000 for most of them and $25,000 for two individuals — based not only on Constitutional violations he alleged occurred in the raid, but on violations of the Department of Homeland Security’s own regulations. He said the arrests “appear to be in retaliation of the city’s adoption of the municipal ID. That is illegal retaliation and a violation of the First and Tenth amendments. People’s homes were entered without permission and without search warrants. A few people were arrested on the street, likely based on their appearance. The city was not notified in advance of the impending raid.” Click here to hear an elaboration.

Malphrus focused in response more on traditional questions that could affect bond — risk of flight, employment history, family and community bonds.

Wishnie and his assistants portrayed their first client, Edison Fernando Yangua-Calva, 26, as having developed deep community ties since arriving in New Haven in 2000. (Fr. Jim Manship of St. Rose of Lima Church was in court and wrote a letter to vouch for his parishioner.) Wishnie spoke of his client as being a valued, long-time employee and a taxpayer.

Then Leigh Mapplebeck, a trial attorney with the office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), pointed to the lack of documentation presented for any of those claims; the fact that Yangua-Calva had lived in Michigan for a few months in 2003 and 2004 and had a Michigan driver’s license; and the fact that except for a cousin and a brother in New Haven (the latter of whom was also arrested), he had no other family in Connecticut.

“I think a $15,000 bond is on the low side,” she opined.

After the back and forth on the first defendant, the judge called a recess. Once court reconvened, the process went much faster for the others.

Wishnie spoke to the media on the sidewalk outside the federal court building after the hearing. He explained that bond is set by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), whose officials could reduce bonds unilaterally, without waiting for a judge, but who have declined to do so.

“The purpose of bond is to ensure their appearance at future court appearances. It’s undisputed that no one here is dangerous,” he said.

He added that of all those arrested, four were able to post the $15,000 bond they were given, and have been released; two more had their $15,000 bonds reduced by a judge in Boston to $3,500 and $1,500 and were due to be released on Thursday

Even if bond is lowered to the minimum of $1,500 for all the remaining defendants, that is still a lot of money for those without resources, as the entire bond must be paid, not a percentage, as is common in other kinds of cases. Sarahí Almonte, executive director of Junta for Progressive Action, said after the hearing that churches, businesses, and individuals are coming forward with donations.

Wishnie said that his team expects to prevail next week in getting the bonds lowered, and then looks forward to fighting the deportations “fiercely.” He said, “We will make motions to suppress and motions to terminate [the cases, based on the alleged violations by DHS and immigration agents during the raid.] We will litigate the lawfulness of what happened in New Haven last Wednesday, and I expect we will win.”

Before the bond hearing began at 9 a.m., about 40 people gathered on the sidewalk in front of the federal building in Hartford to support those detained. They came from Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York (including Long Island).

Click here to listen to Joel Rodriguez, whose father is Puerto Rican and whose mother is a Mohawk Indian from Quebec. As a member of a group that is always exempted from the “everyone in the U.S. is an immigrant” truism, he said, he takes an expansive view of immigration, including his response to whether he wished the native people of the Americas had not been so welcoming of the first European immigrants.

And Click here to listen to David Schultz, who was carrying his 5-year-old, Gabriel, on his shoulders, talk about how the arrests of parents in front of kids his own son’s age affected him.