TOPEKA — CoreCivic will know by Friday whether it will have to delay plans to begin holding Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees in June at its Leavenworth facility.
The city of Leavenworth in March filed suit in U.S. District Court asking for an injunction barring CoreCivic from moving forward on a contract with ICE to turn its closed Leavenworth prison into an immigrant detention facility.
The city also asked the court to determine whether CoreCivic must obtain a special use permit before reopening the prison, as the two parties disagree about whether CoreCivic falls under the city’s development regulations.
U.S. DISTRICT Judge Toby Crouse heard more than two hours of arguments Tuesday and questioned attorneys about why the injunction should be put in place. He promised a quick decision so the city would have time to appeal, if necessary, before CoreCivic follows through on its stated intent of reopening the facility June 1 as the Midwest Regional Reception Center.
“The complaint talks a lot about the scene on the ground,” Crouse said. “I’m not focused on whether this is a good idea or a bad idea.”
Crouse referred to the city’s initial filing that, in part, highlighted what it called the “unquantifiable harm caused by CoreCivic’s mismanagement.”
THE CITY’S filing alleged difficulties CoreCivic caused in Leavenworth in the past, including failing to cooperate with city police, failing to report the death of an inmate for six days and “routinely refusing to turn over evidence.”
Instead, Crouse spent his time questioning whether the city and its attorney, Joseph Hatley, had included a good cause of action in its filings. A cause of action, according to Cornell Law School, is “a set of predefined factual elements that allow for a legal remedy.”
“What basis do I have to act?” Crouse asked Hatley.
Hatley told the judge and asserted in an interview after the hearing that a solid cause of action was CoreCivic officials declining to apply for a special use permit as required by Leavenworth development regulations.
The city of Leavenworth put development regulations in place in 2012, during the time when CoreCivic ran the prison as the Leavenworth Detention Center. At that point, it was grandfathered in because it was already operating, Hatley said.
However, the facility closed in 2021 and has not operated as a detention center since, Hatley said. That means CoreCivic must get a special use permit to reopen, a statement CoreCivic attorney Taylor Hausmann said was inaccurate.
She told Crouse that because CoreCivic has not changed the business it operates at the facility, which was open from 1992 to 2021 as a detention facility, and because they did not abandon the facility, they should not need to get a new special use permit.
HAUSMANN ALSO said she believes the actions the city is taking are politically motivated.
“We think it is telling that the decision to attempt to revoke the special use did not come until after CoreCivic entered into a contract with ICE,” she said. “That’s really what this is about, to leverage greater control over CoreCivic’s operations at the MRRC. We don’t think that’s appropriate.”
Hatley said the city had not filed in court previously because CoreCivic initially agreed with the city and in February applied for a special use permit. Then the company withdrew that application in February and said it did not think one was needed.
