On Friday a Federal Judge in Alexandria dismissed the lawsuit that had been filed against Prince William County over the illegal immigration ordinance the BCOS passed before the election, but that doesn’t mean that future legal challenges are out of the question:
A federal judge yesterday dismissed a lawsuit challenging Prince William County’s closely watched crackdown on illegal immigration, but the ruling leaves open the possibility that attorneys could file a similar suit with a different set of plaintiffs, lawyers said.
U.S. District Judge James C. Cacheris threw out the lawsuit because the 22 plaintiffs lacked legal standing to file it, according to a docket entry filed in U.S. District Court in Alexandria. The judge has not issued a written opinion. But Cacheris specified that his ruling was not based on the merits of the case. Lawyers on both sides said that means another constitutional challenge could be filed.
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Although Cacheris did not explain his reasoning when he dismissed the lawsuit from the bench during a hearing yesterday, he had earlier asked Sarchio whether any of the plaintiffs had been stopped by police and questioned about their immigration status since the resolution passed. Sarchio said she answered no.
Lawyers on both sides said the query appeared to indicate that the judge had accepted a prime county argument against the lawsuit: that none of the plaintiffs had been directly “injured” by the resolution. In court papers filed last month, county attorneys also argued that the case should be thrown out because the county broke no laws and is not targeting anyone for discrimination.
Not an entirely unexpected outcome, but the resolution isn’t out of the woods yet. We can expect more challenges when people who have been directly impacted by the resolution around found; but considering that many of those people will be illegal immigrants picked up by the police for committing other crimes, it’s going to be difficult for them to argue that they have been unconstitutionally harmed.
