Key Legal Brief Filed in Anti-Sanctuary Lawsuit against City of Houston, Houston PD

April 16, 2010

You may recall in September 2009, Judicial Watch filed a lawsuit against the City of Houston, the Houston Police Department (HPD) and a former Houston Police Chief on behalf of Houston Police Sergeant Joslyn Johnson related to the department's illegal alien sanctuary policies. Houston’s policies illegally restrict and prohibit its police officers from communicating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement ("ICE") about illegal aliens who are criminally present in the United States. Sergeant Johnson is the widow of former Houston Police officer Rodney J. Johnson, killed in the line of duty by an illegal alien on September 21, 2006.

The City of Houston (predictably) filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, which is now in federal court, and on March 31, 2010, Sergeant Johnson responded.

We made a number of counter arguments in the response to Houston’s kitchen sink legal strategy. (You can read them all here.) But I want to focus on one particular issue. We point out that the Constitution protects Sergeant Johnson’s rights as a citizen of the United States to report violations of federal laws to federal officials. The brief references a key Supreme Court case from 1895, In re Quarles and Butler, 158 U.S. 532. The Quarles opinion notes that:

It is the duty and the right not only of every peace officer of the United States, but of every citizen, to assist in prosecuting, and in securing the punishment of, any breach of the peace of the United States. It is the right, as well as the duty, of every citizen, when called upon by the proper officer, to act as part of the posse commitatus in upholding the laws of his country.

The Qualres Supreme Court ruling reinforces the concept stated in In re Kemmler, 136 U.S. 436 that the law protects the “privileges and immunities [held by citizens] arising out of the nature and essential character of the national government, and granted or secured by the Constitution of the United States.â€