PHOENIX — Saying a trial judge got it wrong, immigrant rights groups are asking a federal appeals court to overturn her ruling that upheld the controversial “papers please” provision of SB 1070.
Attorney Jorge Castillo of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education fund said Monday the ruling by Judge Susan Bolton last month was based on “a technicality.” Castillo said he believes the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will see the issue in a different light.
But the “technicality” that Bolton said forms the basis for her ruling is more than a simple problem like a misfiled paper or citing the wrong law.
“We failed to allege and to demonstrate that this law was going to be, on its face, targeting Latino community and the immigrant community,” Castillo said.
“That opinion is flat-out wrong on a legal basis because we all know the community that SB 1070 on its face will reach,” he continued. “And we all know the community that SB 1070’s debaters and creators were attempting to reach.”
Alessandra Soler, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona, said that evidence is there. She rattled off a list of incident around the state she said prove that police are using the law to target minorities.
But Castillo said there were “evidentiary problems” in Bolton’s court.
“Not everything that were we entitled to were we able to get,” he said, with Bolton rejecting some of the requests to go after certain documents. For example, the judge rejected a bid to get the notes for the book written by Jan Brewer, who was governor at the time and signed the 2010 measure into law. “And not everything that we were able to get were we able to effectively present.”
Activist Salvador Reza put the issue with Bolton’s ruling in more basic terms.
“I don’t know how she could arrive at the conclusion there was no discriminatory intent,” he said. “I don’t know how she could arrive at the conclusion that the law was neutral in its intent.”
Jim Shee, vice president the Asian Chamber of Commerce and a plaintiff in the lawsuit, said this is not just a Latino issue.
He cited a recent report by Pew Hispanic that predicts that by 2055 Asian immigrants will outnumber those of Hispanic descent. And he said there is a history of discrimination as shown by what happened during World War II when citizens of Japanese ancestry, including the woman who would become his wife, were interred in camps.
“This discrimination and dehumanization is still here today,” Shee said.
The provision of the law at issue requires police to check the immigration status of people they have stopped for other reasons is racially discriminatory.
Bolton did not dispute contention that most of the people affected in Arizona may be Hispanic. But she said the law itself is racially neutral.
The judge also upheld another section of SB 1070 that requires verification of the immigration status of someone who already has been arrested. She said nothing in that provision expands the rights of police officers to make warrantless arrests.
