The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) provided incorrect data in connection with a major immigrant-rights case, according to reports.
The admission comes as the U.S. Supreme Court prepares to hear a similar case next term, Jess Bravin of the Wall Street Journal reports.
The case, Denmore v. Kim, was adjudicated in 2003. The justices were asked to decide whether a provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which allows the federal government to detain legal immigrants with criminal convictions for indefinite periods of time without a bond hearing, infringes on an individual’s liberty interest. A five justice majority led by then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist upheld the provision, relying in part on data provided by DOJ. The Court said that the average detention period in such cases, four months according to the Department, was not long enough to trigger a constitutional controversy.
The four month figure has since been revised by the DOJ, which disclosed to the SCOTUS that the accurate figure is 382 days, nearly four times the original estimate. (RELATED: SCOTUS Takes On Case With HUGE Implications For Illegal Immigration)
Acting Solicitor General Ian Gershengorn urged the justices to remedy the figure in their ruling, but indicated that their holding in the case was still, to the government’s reading, “understandable.”
A similar case, Rodriguez v. Robbins, is currently pending before the Court and will be heard after the justices reconvene in October. The Court will decide whether illegal immigrants held in U.S. custody longer than six months are eligible for a bond hearing, where they can petition for their release.
A class action lawsuit challenging the federal government’s practice of holding illegal immigrants without the benefit of a bond hearing was first organized by the ACLU in 2008. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a district court ruling in October, 2015, which ordered that bond hearings be held for every illegal immigrant in American custody longer than six months. The Ninth Circuit said that current federal practice violated constitutional due-process guarantees.
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