FBI agents have arrested a local judge in Wisconsin whom the bureau says tried to help an illegal immigrant duck out of her courtroom before he could be nabbed by deportation officers.
FBI Director Kash Patel said Judge Hannah Dugan, who sits in Milwaukee, is charged with obstruction.
“We believe Judge Dugan intentionally misdirected federal agents away from the subject to be arrested in her courthouse,” Mr. Patel said in a social media post.
He identified the target immigration officers were seeking as Eduardo Flores Ruiz.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel said a man named Eduardo Florez-Ruiz was in Judge Dugan’s courtroom on April 18. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrived and went to see the chief judge. At that point, Judge Dugan sent the man out a side door and down a private hallway, the newspaper reported.
Mr. Patel, in his post, said the man managed to evade arrest at first, but agents chased him down and he’s now in federal custody.
The arrest of the judge drew criticism from liberal activists.
The National Women’s Law Center called it part of President Trump’s “contempt for the courts and our Constitution.”
“The FBI’s apparent decision to make an example of Judge Dugan is part of a broader and deeply alarming agenda to silence dissent, incite fear, and erode the very institutions that protect our rights. The Trump administration’s lawlessness is a threat to everyone in this country,” said Alison Gill, director of nominations and democracy at the NWLC.
But Judge Dugan isn’t the first to face federal charges for assisting an illegal immigrant.
In 2019, prosecutors brought charges against Judge Shelley Richmond Joseph in Massachusetts after authorities said she assisted an illegal immigrant in evading arrest. ICE officers were waiting in the courthouse to pick him up.
Judge Joseph ordered the officer to remain outside her courtroom under a local policy limiting cooperation with ICE. After an off-the-record conversation with the illegal immigrant’s lawyer, Judge Joseph let the man go back downstairs through a side entrance. Another court officer let the man escape out a back door.
The Biden Justice Department dropped the charges against Judge Joseph in 2022 after she agreed to submit herself to the state’s judicial conduct board.
Meanwhile in New Mexico, a local judge resigned — and he and his wife have now been charged — after authorities said they were harboring a Venezuelan illegal immigrant connected to the Tren de Aragua gang, now a designated terrorist organization.
Joel and Nancy Cano had taken Cristhian Ortega-Lopez into their Las Cruces home sometime last year, according to court documents.
Authorities say the Canos’ daughter, April, allowed Mr. Ortega-Lopez to use her guns for shooting. Federal authorities also linked Mr. Ortega-Lopez to TdA through his social media accounts, tattoos, clothing and “hand gestures.”
