Out-of-state immigration detainees are entering Wyoming in high volumes, including a batch of 44 transported Friday to Casper.
That’s to alleviate the constant overcrowding of the U.S. Immigration Enforcement and Customs (ICE) detention facility in Aurora, Colorado, an ICE official told Cowboy State Daily on Monday.
“So, Natrona County just went to (a prolonged hold contract) starting July 1,” said the official, whom Cowboy State Daily agreed not to name as part of a Monday ICE ride-along.
The county agreed to accept 46 detainees. ICE ultimately brought 44, Natrona County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Kiera Hett said in a Monday email.
As of Monday, the jail had 255 inmates, with a capacity of 476.
The new detainees were all booked Friday evening at the rate of $95 a day, said Hett.
“No, there aren’t any circumstances where they’d be released by our sheriff’s office from (Natrona County Detention Center) into the community,” she added.
ICE officials confirmed the point, not just for Natrona County but also for others with prolonged federal holding contracts like Sweetwater and Uinta Counties.
“I would double emphasize that is not (happening),” said a U.S. Department of Homeland Security Official who spoke with Cowboy State Daily last week. “Whoever we’re sending up there, they’d have to come back down here to go before an immigration judge (before release). They wouldn’t be getting a … hearing up there.”
That’s because Wyoming doesn’t have an immigration court, he added.
Long Way From Court
Laramie-based immigration attorney Travis Helm, conversely, voiced concern with the out-of-state detainee influx, which he said could overburden smaller, more rural jails — even if it hasn’t yet.
Another concern, said Helm, is that immigration attorneys may have a harder time contacting their clients amid the frequent movement.
Different jails have different visitation schedules and accommodations — and some immigration attorneys work as volunteers, Helm said.
He added, “If these were truly the worst of the worst (criminal elements among illegal immigrants), why are we importing them to be in jail with our friends, neighbors, and children who get DUIs?”
ICE officials, conversely, praised the arrangements as a measure helping the agency to be more efficient in its work.
Robert Guadian, ICE field office Director for Colorado and Wyoming, said the remaining capacity in Natrona County’s jail makes him want to move even more inmates there, but he’d leave the ultimate say on that with the local sheriff, who knows of other facility concerns.
“I don’t want to overwhelm them, right. They just started holding ICE detainees longterm for us, and I haven’t talked to the sheriff in Wyoming,” said Guadian. “Whatever he’d feel comfortable with based on his staffing levels.”
There are now 60,000 ICE detainees in custody across the United States.
Ideally, the agency would reach capacity for 100,000, said Guadian.
The Aurora facility, which is always full, has 15,000 beds, he said.
Mostly From Colorado
Between Jan. 20 and June 10, the Sweetwater County Sheriff’s Office booked 80 ICE detainees, spokesman Jason Mower told Cowboy State Daily last week.
Of those, 18 were local Sweetwater County arrests that ended with ICE placing detainers, or requests to hold, on them so that the sheriff would hold them until the agency retrieved them for other proceedings.
The other 62 were placed there for detention, Mower added.
At the time the hold rate for Sweetwater was $61.57.
But that rate has roughly doubled in the past few days after weeks of negotiation, an ICE official told Cowboy State Daily during the Monday ride-along.
Here You Go
The Uinta County Sheriff’s Office normally holds up to five detainees for ICE, Sheriff Andy Kopp told Cowboy State Daily in a Monday phone interview.
As of May, most of those are coming from Salt Lake City’s ICE region, not the Denver-based region to which Wyoming’s ICE officers answer.
Uinta’s federal holding contract is an old one dating back to 2018, and still stuck at a $66 per day rate for holds, said Kopp, but “we’re in the process of upping that to where our match daily rate (is) $120.”
Laramie, Carbon and Campbell County jails also can hold ICE detainees longterm under agreements with the agency.
Some other jails, such as Platte County, can hold federal detainees longer than is normally allowed without an ongoing state charge under other federal agreements.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
