Claims and Bad Faith Law Blog

Last Thursday ICE abducted a person who was standing trial.

(oneag news agency; Wikimedia Commons)

 

The person, Wilson Martell-Lebron, was on trial for providing false information on an application for a license. He was on trial for a crime.

On the first day of his criminal trial in Boston Municipal Court, Martell-Lebron was abducted by ICE. ICE says that he is from the Dominican and that he was in the U.S. without sufficient documentation. I understand that this is a civil offense, not a crime.

The criminal trial judge, Judge Mark Summerville, conducted an inquiry. He reportedly heard testimony about the incident from the Assistant District Attorney last Friday, testimony which finished up on Monday of this week.

Judge Summerville found that ICE premeditated their obstruction of justice in this criminal case. He further found ICE agent Brian Sullivan responsible, that Sullivan "conspired in a premeditated manner" to obstruct justice by abducting Martell-Lebron, and that Sullivan was a member of the prosecutorial team (at least for purposes of this issue).

Judge Summerville further found that ICE agent Sullivan "intentionally" and "egregiously" deprived Martell-Lebron of Constitutional rights, and that ICE and Sullivan have no intention of returning Martell-Lebron to resume his criminal trial.

The judge was quoted in reports as saying that "I find that this court cannot trust ICE to return the defendant back to court. I don't find that they're credible. I have no confidence in ICE no matter what they told the Commonwealth, that they would ever bring this defendant into court."

Following this inquiry, the judge found Sullivan in contempt.

The judge also dismissed the criminal charges against Wilson Martell-Lebron for prosecutorial misconduct.

So far, I have seen four of these videos filmed during three abductions which are becoming commonplace. ICE agents abduct someone and bundle them into a waiting black SUV. (I assume that they are agents from ICE because that is what they say, but who knows the truth of who they work for?)

It has not been reported so far as I know, but it is not hard to pick up a pattern from these kidnapping videos: There are always 6 people involved in the abduction, all of them always in plain clothes, they use handcuffs, and they are often but not always masked.

The person they abduct is always alone.

So, in this case, if the judge had wanted to, there seems to have been enough legally sufficient evidence to warrant finding 6 "agents" in contempt, without stopping just at Sullivan.

Back to Mr. Martell-Lebron's abduction and his criminal trial that was scheduled to start in Judge Summerville's courtroom last Thursday. I look at this situation from the standpoint of the people who were in that courtroom. There was the judge, the defense attorney, and the prosecutor. For some reason I do not know, reportedly there were also two Massachusetts State Troopers there.

The judge and the defense attorney apparently had no inkling that ICE was waiting to seize Martell-Lebron. The Assistant District Attorney did not know that ICE would seize the defendant during trial, the judge found.

The question becomes whether anyone associated with this incident knew that ICE was planning to abduct the defendant as soon as the trial concluded.  The reporting is unclear although one of the State Troopers reportedly testified last Friday that Ice Agent Sullivan told him and the prosecutor that ICE planned to abduct the defendant, apparently on the first day of trial.

A statement by a spokesperson for the Massachusetts State Troopers offered that the State Troopers followed the department’s policy of not speaking about ICE plans if they know what ICE is going to do.

Whatever anyone knew about ICE plans for Mr. Martell-Lebron, they apparently did not tell either the judge or the defense attorney.

• The judge, who is very likely to deal with the two State Troopers in future cases, has seen with his own eyes and heard with his own ears that the loyalties of these two State Troopers probably do not lie with him or his Court, or with Massachusetts and its laws. If they were, they would have told the judge what ICE was planning to do if they knew it in advance.  The judge reportedly said as much himself in the Hearing.
• Returning to that statement by a spokesperson for the State Police, this apparently was supposed to exonerate the two State Troopers involved in this situation because the Troopers supposedly neither stopped ICE or helped ICE. I call BS. They helped ICE by staying silent. That is what they wanted to do; we know that because that is what they did.

Think on this as well. ICE and its masters have made it pretty clear that they have no respect for persons they find on the street or in their homes including on Thursday of last week in Massachusetts.

And think on this: ICE and its masters showed clearly and beyond any reasonable doubt on Monday that they have no respect for judges, the United States, or the law.

Please read the disclaimer.  ©2025 Dennis J. Wall.  All rights reserved.  Interested in many things including Claims and Bad Faith Law?  Sign up for a free subscription to my Substack newsletter. 

PRESCRIBING TIMES, PLACES, MANNER HOLDING ELECTIONS ALWAYS SUBJECT, NEVER ABSOLUTE.

The Constitution of the United States provides, in part here pertinent:

The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.

U.S. Const. art. 1, § 4.  Much has been made of this "Elections Clause" by at least 4, maybe 5, Justices currently sitting on the Supreme Court.  See Supreme Power,  published here.

They have advanced a theory that this clause makes State legislatures "independent," meaning not subject to review by anyone or anything except the federal Supreme Court on which they now sit.  Not reviewable by other federal Courts.  Not reviewable by State Supreme Courts or any State Courts at all.  Not subject to State Constitutions.

This was the basis for accepting review in Moore v. Harper.  The North Carolina Supreme Court held that because the legislature's districting legislation violated provisions of the North Carolina State Constitution, the districting was invalid.  This group of federal Justices, confident of a majority vote, shares the collective aim of announcing that the North Carolina Supreme Court's invalidation of Republican-legislated Congressional districts in that case cannot withstand their gaze. 

Under their "independent state legislatures" theory, the districting prescribed by the North Carolina Legislature is not subject to anyone else's review even if, as in this case, the highest Court of the State held that the districting violated a provision of the North Carolina Constitution that guarantees fair and free elections, among other provisions of the North Carolina Constitution.

This theory suffers from many fatal infirmities, not the least of which is that the U.S. Supreme Court has already rejected it.  In fact, in Smiley v. Holm, 285 U.S. 355, 52 S. Ct. 397 (1932), the Court reversed the exact same view now advanced by some of the Justices currently sitting in Washington. 

Without getting too much into the weeds, as they say, in Smiley the Supreme Court of Wisconsin held that the State legislature was independent of review even if the Wisconsin Legislature's redistricting legislation was vetoed by the Governor of Wisconsin.  The U.S. Supreme Court detailed this history in Smiley, 285 U.S. at 364-65, 52 S. Ct. at 398-99.

The U.S. Supreme Court held that Article 1, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution provides that the exercise of authority under that clause "must be in accordance with the method which the state has prescribed for legislative enactments."  Smiley, 285 U.S. at 367, 52 S. Ct. at 399.  Wisconsin's method of enacting legislation was and is the method followed in most if not all States today:  Legislative bills have to be presented to the governor for approval.   A legislative measure "redistricting the state for congressional elections" was  therefore subject to review by the Governor of Wisconsin, like any other legislative measure in Wisconsin.  Smiley, 285 U.S. at 363-64, 52 S. Ct. at 398.

Since in this case the Governor of Wisconsin had vetoed the redistricting bill enacted by the Legislature of Wisconsin when he "returned it without his approval," Smiley, 285 U.S. at 361, 52 S. Ct. at 397, the bill did not become law.  Instead, it was invalid because it did not pass review by the governor.

In Moore v. Harper, the same Elections Clause is raised because the North Carolina Legislature's gerrymandered districting did not pass review by the North Carolina Supreme Court under the North Carolina Constitution.  There really is no difference with past precedent concerning the  Elections Clause in the federal Constitution, and that's the point.

Helen White has pointed out at Justsecurity.org that as recently as 2019, a different makeup of the U.S. Supreme Court held unanimously that State Constitutions could trump State Legislatures' partisan gerrymandering in congressional elections despite the Elections Clause in the federal Constituiton.  Rucho v. Common Cause, ___ U.S. ___, 139 S. Ct. 2484 (2019).  

In 2015, a different majority of Justices rejected the idea that state legislatures are independent authorities by upholding the use of independent redistricting commissions in federal elections to prescribe the "times, places and manner of holding elections for senators and representatives," to again use the words of Article 1, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution. Ariz. St. Legis. v. Ariz. Indep. Redistrict. Comm'n, 576 U.S. 787, 135 S. Ct. 2652 (2015).

The same four or five Justices who push their unique "independent state legislatures" theory in 2022 are the same Justices who have no use for precedents or for previously settled law.  Rather, they share the view that what they say is the law, rather like their view that State Legislatures are not reviewable except, perhaps, by them or by some other group of Justices who have enough votes.  Their unyielding view is obviously established already; it will not be changed by legal reasoning or resort to things previously decided.

What can be done?  What is a just response to judges making law by lining up votes rather than reasons?

To be continued soon on Claims and Issues Blog, where related issues have previously been addressed.

Please read the disclaimer.  ©2022 Dennis J. Wall.  All rights reserved.