US judge accused of helping man evade immigration agents and is arrested

A spokesperson for the US Marshals Service said Hannah Dugan, a Milwaukee County circuit judge, was arrested at the courthouse where she works on Friday morning

FBI director Kash Patel said in a social media post that federal agents arrested a judge on obstruction charges related to an immigration enforcement operation last week. The post was later deleted. File picture: AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

The FBI has arrested a Milwaukee judge accused of helping a man evade immigration authorities, escalating a clash between Donald Trump’s administration and the judiciary over the Republican president’s sweeping immigration crackdown.

FBI director Kash Patel announced on social media the arrest of Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan, who he said “intentionally misdirected” federal agents away from a man they were trying to take into custody at her courthouse last week.

“Thankfully our agents chased down the perp on foot and he’s been in custody since, but the Judge’s obstruction created increased danger to the public,” Mr Patel wrote.

Ms Dugan was taken into custody by the FBI on Friday morning on the courthouse grounds, according to US Marshals Service spokesperson Brady McCarron.

She appeared briefly in federal court in Milwaukee later Friday before being released from custody. Her next court appearance is May 15.

“Judge Dugan wholeheartedly regrets and protests her arrest. It was not made in the interest of public safety,” her lawyer, Craig Mastantuono, said during the hearing.

Ms Dugan is charged with “concealing an individual to prevent his discovery and arrest” and obstructing or impeding a proceeding.

She is accused of escorting the man, Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, and his lawyer out of the courtroom through the jury door on April 18 as a way to help avert his arrest, according to an FBI affidavit filed in court.

The affidavit suggests that the judge was alerted to the presence of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the courthouse by her clerk, who was informed by a lawyer that they appeared to be in the hallway.

The affidavit describes Judge Dugan as “visibly angry” over the arrival of immigration agents in the courthouse and says that she pronounced the situation “absurd” before leaving the bench and retreating to her chambers. 

It says she and another judge later approached members of the arrest team inside the courthouse, displaying what witnesses described as a “confrontational, angry demeanour”.

She asked one of the officers if they had a judicial warrant and was told that the warrant was instead administrative. After a back-and-forth over the warrant, the affidavit says, she demanded that the arrest team speak with the chief judge and led them away from the courtroom.

After directing the arrest team to the chief judge’s office, investigators say she returned to the courtroom and was heard saying words to the effect of “wait, come with me” before ushering Flores-Ruiz and his lawyer through a jury door into a non-public area of the courthouse.

The action was unusual, the affidavit says, because “only deputies, juries, court staff, and in-custody defendants being escorted by deputies used the back jury door. Defence attorneys and defendants who were not in custody never used the jury door”.

Her arrest comes amid a growing feud between the Trump administration and the judiciary over the president’s executive actions on immigration and other matters. Trump administration officials have sharply criticised what they have described as “activist” judges they say claim have overstepped their authority and unfairly impinged on the president’s executive powers by blocking many of his efforts.

US senator Tammy Baldwin, a Democrat who represents Wisconsin, called the arrest of a sitting judge a “gravely serious and drastic move” that “threatens to breach” the separation of power between the executive and judicial branches.

“Make no mistake, we do not have kings in this country and we are a democracy governed by laws that everyone must abide by,” Ms Baldwin said in an emailed statement. “By relentlessly attacking the judicial system, flouting court orders, and arresting a sitting judge, this president is putting those basic democratic values that Wisconsinites hold dear on the line.”