A memo sent last year by President Judge Susan Evashavik DiLucente to four administrative judges in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas could shed light on questions occupying county council as it grapples with a proposal to ban cooperation with federal immigration agencies.

The April 3 memo laid out sheriff’s office procedures for when ICE seeks to make an arrest in the courthouse, noting deputies would detain individuals for ICE, bring them “out of public view,” and transfer them to ICE custody. A later email said deputy sheriffs would “escort” ICE agents through the court to their target.

Sheriff Kevin Kraus, a Democrat, has maintained that his office does not cooperate with ICE. In a Wednesday statement to Public Source, spokesperson Mike Manko said the memo was written early in the office’s discussions on managing “ICE-related activity with respect to its impact on court operations.”

Manko acknowledged the memo was distributed to the judiciary last year, but said “what is described in that communication was never implemented.”

Now, Manko wrote in a statement to Public Source, the Sheriff’s Office’s policy is “strict neutrality.” The office “does not enforce immigration laws” and “does not take individuals into custody on behalf of ICE,” nor “sequester or detain individuals for the purpose of immigration enforcement.”

Manko noted that ICE agents have access to courts like any member of the public and had sometimes arrived at court unannounced before the protocol was drafted.

Last week, amid discussions on a bill to prohibit cooperation between county employees and ICE agents, at-large Councilor Bethany Hallam accused the Sheriff’s Office of aiding immigration agents in county courthouses, where deputies are tasked with maintaining order.

Council’s Public Safety Committee is scheduled to vote this afternoon on whether to recommend the bill’s passage. A full council vote could come as soon as Tuesday.

The discussions last week did not reference the memo, which has not previously been reported.

“ICE is showing up in very coincidental situations,” Hallam said during last week’s committee meeting. She said she had “no concrete proof,” but alleged that interactions between deputies and ICE have “been a very blatant, visible thing that’s been happening. The sheriffs are holding people and then giving them to ICE.”

“If you ask the sheriff, he will tell you they do not do that and will not do that,” Hallam added.

Memo rattled immigrant supporters 

According to Evashavik DiLucente’s email from last April, the sheriff’s command staff would be notified if ICE planned to execute a warrant in the courthouse, Family Law Center or the City-County Building. From there, the memo states, deputies inform the judge or court administration and, once the proceeding ends, “take the person into custody and escort them to a Sheriff’s Office space, out of public view, where custody will be transferred to federal agents.” 

After the transfer, deputies escort the person and the agents out of the building, per the email.

The memo drew criticism from legal and advocacy groups, culminating in a letter to Evashavik DiLucente expressing concern with the practices it outlined.

The letter, penned by the Community Justice Project and the ACLU of Pennsylvania on behalf of Casa San José on May 5, stated those policies would limit court access for immigrants and “reduce trust in local law enforcement by enabling the Sheriff’s Office to arrest immigrant court users for unrelated purported immigration violations.”

The letter raised further concerns about the impact on immigrant communities’ access to the legal system, particularly Family Court where child custody, domestic and abuse petitions are heard.    

“The Sheriff’s Office will conduct arrests at ICE’s behest in buildings dedicated solely to civil proceedings, effectively barring many immigrant litigants from filing civil cases,” the letter claimed.

Courts clarify sheriff protocol

Evashavik DiLucente sent another email to the administrative judges June 23 clarifying the protocols. In that memo, she did not mention deputies taking people into custody, but wrote that they would instead “escort the ICE agents to the person and then escort the person and ICE agents to a non-public area.” Most of the other language was largely unchanged.

In his Wednesday statement, Manko said the sheriff’s office requests “notification of any ICE/HSI  [Homeland Security Investigations] taking place in our facilities for … maintaining public safety, order and decorum and limiting interruptions to court operations and individual proceedings.”    

ICE did not respond to a request for comment. A representative of Allegheny County Court Administration did not respond to questions, but did provide the updated June email.

During a committee meeting Feb. 12, council members said they are largely unaware how much interaction county employees, across departments, have with ICE and other federal agencies. Councilor Alex Rose expressed a need for clarity on the role of the county sheriff: “I want straight answers on what are the sheriff’s deputies actually doing.”

Quinn Glabicki is a reporter and photojournalist at Pittsburgh’s Public Source. He can be reached at quinn@publicsource.org and on Instagram @quinnglabicki.

Charlie Wolfson contributed to this report.

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Sheriff’s ICE interactions, in flux for nearly a year, at center of Allegheny County debate

by Quinn Glabicki, Pittsburgh's Public Source
February 19, 2026

<h1>Sheriff’s ICE interactions, in flux for nearly a year, at center of Allegheny County debate</h1> <p class="byline">by Quinn Glabicki, Pittsburgh's Public Source <br />February 19, 2026</p> <p>A memo sent last year by President Judge Susan Evashavik DiLucente to four administrative judges in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas could shed light on questions occupying county council as it grapples with a proposal to ban cooperation with federal immigration agencies.</p> <p>The April 3 memo laid out sheriff’s office procedures for when ICE seeks to make an arrest in the courthouse, noting deputies would detain individuals for ICE, bring them “out of public view,” and transfer them to ICE custody. A later email said deputy sheriffs would “escort” ICE agents through the court to their target.</p> <p>Sheriff Kevin Kraus, a Democrat, has maintained that his office does not cooperate with ICE. In a Wednesday statement to Public Source, spokesperson Mike Manko said the memo was written early in the office’s discussions on managing “ICE-related activity with respect to its impact on court operations.”</p> <p>Manko acknowledged the memo was distributed to the judiciary last year, but said “what is described in that communication was never implemented.”</p> <p>Now, Manko wrote in a statement to Public Source, the Sheriff’s Office’s policy is “strict neutrality.” The office “does not enforce immigration laws” and “does not take individuals into custody on behalf of ICE,” nor “sequester or detain individuals for the purpose of immigration enforcement.”</p> <p>Manko noted that ICE agents have access to courts like any member of the public and had sometimes arrived at court unannounced before the protocol was drafted.</p> <p>Last week, amid discussions on <a href="https://www.publicsource.org/allegheny-county-council-legislation-ban-ice-cooperation/">a bill to prohibit cooperation</a> between county employees and ICE agents, at-large Councilor Bethany Hallam accused the Sheriff’s Office of aiding immigration agents in county courthouses, where deputies are tasked with maintaining order.</p> <p>Council’s Public Safety Committee is scheduled to vote this afternoon on whether to recommend the bill’s passage. A full council vote could come as soon as Tuesday.</p> <p>The discussions last week did not reference the memo, which has not previously been reported.</p> <p>“ICE is showing up in very coincidental situations,” Hallam said during last week’s committee meeting. She said she had “no concrete proof,” but alleged that interactions between deputies and ICE have “been a very blatant, visible thing that’s been happening. The sheriffs are holding people and then giving them to ICE.”</p> <p>“If you ask the sheriff, he will tell you they do not do that and will not do that,” Hallam added.</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-memo-rattled-immigrant-supporters"><strong>Memo rattled immigrant supporters </strong></h2> <p>According to Evashavik DiLucente’s email from last April, the sheriff's command staff would be notified if ICE planned to execute a warrant in the courthouse, Family Law Center or the City-County Building. From there, the memo states, deputies inform the judge or court administration and, once the proceeding ends, “take the person into custody and escort them to a Sheriff’s Office space, out of public view, where custody will be transferred to federal agents.”&nbsp;</p> <p>After the transfer, deputies escort the person and the agents out of the building, per the email.</p> <figure class="wp-block-image aligncenter size-full"><img src="https://www.publicsource.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/IMG_6394-2.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-1329694" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">An email sent last year by President Judge Susan Evashavik DiLucente to four administrative judges in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas laid out Sheriff’s Office procedures when ICE seeks to make an arrest in the courthouse.</figcaption></figure> <p>The memo drew criticism from legal and advocacy groups, culminating in a letter to Evashavik DiLucente expressing concern with the practices it outlined.</p> <p>The letter, penned by the Community Justice Project and the ACLU of Pennsylvania on behalf of Casa San José on May 5, stated those policies would limit court access for immigrants and “reduce trust in local law enforcement by enabling the Sheriff’s Office to arrest immigrant court users for unrelated purported immigration violations.”</p> <p>The letter raised further concerns about the impact on immigrant communities’ access to the legal system, particularly Family Court where child custody, domestic and abuse petitions are heard.    </p> <p>“The Sheriff’s Office will conduct arrests at ICE’s behest in buildings dedicated solely to civil proceedings, effectively barring many immigrant litigants from filing civil cases,” the letter claimed.</p> <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-courts-clarify-sheriff-protocol"><strong>Courts clarify sheriff protocol</strong></h2> <p>Evashavik DiLucente sent another email to the administrative judges June 23 clarifying the protocols. In that memo, she did not mention deputies taking people into custody, but wrote that they would instead “escort the ICE agents to the person and then escort the person and ICE agents to a non-public area.” Most of the other language was largely unchanged.</p> <p>In his Wednesday statement, Manko said the sheriff’s office requests “notification of any ICE/HSI  [Homeland Security Investigations] taking place in our facilities for … maintaining public safety, order and decorum and limiting interruptions to court operations and individual proceedings.”    </p> <p>ICE did not respond to a request for comment. A representative of Allegheny County Court Administration did not respond to questions, but did provide the updated June email.</p> <p>During a committee meeting Feb. 12, council members said they are largely unaware how much interaction county employees, across departments, have with ICE and other federal agencies. Councilor Alex Rose expressed a need for clarity on the role of the county sheriff: “I want straight answers on what are the sheriff’s deputies actually doing.”</p> <p><em>Quinn Glabicki is a reporter and photojournalist at Pittsburgh’s Public Source. He can be reached at quinn@publicsource.org and on Instagram @quinnglabicki.</em></p> <p><em>Charlie Wolfson contributed to this report.</em></p> <p>This &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://www.publicsource.org/allegheny-county-sheriff-ice-interactions/&quot;&gt;article&lt;/a&gt; first appeared on &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://www.publicsource.org&quot;&gt;Pittsburgh&#039;s Public Source&lt;/a&gt; and is republished here under a &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/&quot;&gt;Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;img src=&quot;https://i0.wp.com/www.publicsource.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/cropped-ps_circle_favicon_blue.png?resize=150%2C150&amp;amp;ssl=1&quot; style=&quot;width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;&quot;&gt;</p> &lt;img id=&quot;republication-tracker-tool-source&quot; src=&quot;https://www.publicsource.org/?republication-pixel=true&amp;post=1329693&amp;amp;ga4=G-CCLXQK5C14&quot; style=&quot;width:1px;height:1px;&quot;&gt;&lt;script&gt; PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: &quot;https://www.publicsource.org/allegheny-county-sheriff-ice-interactions/&quot;, urlref: window.location.href }); } } &lt;/script&gt; &lt;script id=&quot;parsely-cfg&quot; src=&quot;//cdn.parsely.com/keys/publicsource.org/p.js&quot;&gt;&lt;/script&gt;

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