He’s a U.S. citizen, but ICE detained him and tried to deport him. Now he’s getting $150k

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will pay Brian Bukle $150,000 under a settlement over the U.S. citizen’s unlawful arrest and detention in 2020.

The Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Asian Law Caucus and the ACLU Foundation of Northern California in late 2021 filed a lawsuit against ICE over Bukle’s wrongful arrest. Months before the lawsuit was filed, a government report had found the need for ICE to better train its officers to verify people’s citizenship.

Bukle is a resident of Corona in Riverside County.

Bukle, who was 62 at the time the lawsuit was filed, spent 36 days at the Mesa Verde ICE Processing Facility in Bakersfield in the midst of a COVID-19 outbreak before the government acknowledged his U.S. citizenship. According to the lawsuit, an immigration judge later threw out his deportation case.

Bukle said he doesn’t want anyone else to experience what he went through.

“Cases like mine are important because it helps agencies like ICE realize that what they are doing is completely wrong and helps others who are harmed by ICE know that there are people out there who care about their rights and will fight alongside them,” Bukle told The Bee in a statement through a communications person.

An ICE spokesperson late on Tuesday said the agency doesn’t “comment on ongoing or pending litigation and outcomes.”

California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation officials transferred Bukle into ICE’s custody in mid-2020 when two G4S Secure Solutions guards arrived to pick him up. The same civil rights organizations in early 2021 also sued ICE over what they described as an “illegal practice” of using private security guards to arrest people.

Under a settlement this summer, ICE was banned from using private contractors to arrest immigrants.

Minju Cho, a staff attorney at ACLU of Northern California, said Bukle’s lawsuit “exposed how ICE continually violates people’s civil rights,” and how it works closely with the California prison system.

“We are pleased that Mr. Bukle prevailed in his claims against ICE, but we are mindful that no amount of money can give someone back the time they lost while wrongfully detained,” Cho told The Bee in a statement. “No amount of money can undo the trauma that a person experiences in immigration detention.”

Bukle’s case, Cho said, also shows “how ICE transfers amplify racism within the criminal legal system and immigration system.” Bukle is a Black immigrant from the British Virgin Islands and derived U.S. citizenship from both of his naturalized parents.

“We know that Black immigrants like Mr. Bukle are significantly more likely to be targeted for deportation: in the U.S., 7% of noncitizens are Black, but they make up 20% of those facing deportation after interactions with the criminal legal system, according to Black Alliance for Just Immigration,” Cho said.

Bukle said he’s now trying to heal and rebuild his life. He hopes the settlement will provide some support for him and his family to move on.

“This is about making sure no one else is unjustly denied their basic rights and separated from their families just because of where they were born,” he said.

Ultimately, Cho said, the double punishment of immigrants and refugees must end.

“In a national movement for immigrant justice, Mr. Bukle’s courage has inspired many people to organize together and call on their elected leaders to uphold our values of justice and equality,” she said.