The attorney for 14 Latino immigrants in Maury County has filed an amended federal lawsuit, saying that his clients were illegally arrested and detained in four raids earlier this year.

The lawsuit, which was filed Friday in Nashville by immigration attorney Elliott Ozment, expands the scope of the original lawsuit by including raids that took place in May and June in Maury County.

The original lawsuit, which was filed July 5, concerned a July 3 raid of American Mobile Village in Columbia in which 18 Latino immigrants were arrested. Maury County Sheriff Enoch George said at the time that the immigrants were discovered to be in the country illegally during a search for a rape suspect.

The amended lawsuit accuses George, three of his deputies and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers of conspiring to make mass arrests of Hispanic immigrants based solely on their ethnicity on five separate occasions, including during the July 3 raid.

The lawsuit also says that ICE officers entered the immigrants' homes without warrants and placed federal detainers on the defendants that would normally be used only for illegal immigrants who were found with illicit drugs.

Several exhibits detailing similar incidents in other states are included in the filing.

— COLBY SLEDGE

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