Monroe County sheriff sues over new Indiana law requiring compliance with ICE detainers

Written from press release

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — April 9, 2026

Monroe County Sheriff Ruben Marté has filed a federal lawsuit challenging part of a new Indiana law that would require local law enforcement to hold people based solely on immigration detainer requests from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The suit, filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, argues that Senate Enrolled Act 76 violates the Fourth Amendment by requiring the sheriff’s office to detain people without a judicial warrant or probable cause that they committed a crime.

According to the complaint, ICE detainers are requests from federal immigration authorities asking local law enforcement agencies to keep someone in custody for up to 48 hours beyond the time they would otherwise be released so ICE can take them into custody.

Marté argues that holding someone past their release date based only on an administrative immigration detainer amounts to a new seizure under the Fourth Amendment and cannot be done lawfully without a warrant or probable cause.

The lawsuit asks the federal court to block that portion of the law from taking effect and declare it unconstitutional to the extent it requires compliance with immigration detainer requests in the absence of a judicial warrant.

SEA 76 was signed into law March 5 and is set to take effect July 1.

Since 2023, the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office has maintained a policy directing officers not to detain someone past their release date based solely on a non-criminal or administrative ICE detainer request.

The new law would override that policy, according to the lawsuit.

The sheriff’s ICE detainer policy is already the subject of separate litigation brought by Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita in state court in 2024.

The federal lawsuit was filed by attorneys from the Monroe County Legal Department and the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection at Georgetown University Law Center.

Marté, elected sheriff in 2022, previously worked for 31 years with the Indiana State Police.

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