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For the third weekday in a row, public defenders Tuesday staged a walkout from a New York City courthouse to protest the presence of federal immigration authorities who came to arrest immigrants who showed up for court appearances.

But despite growing calls from defense attorneys and elected officials for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to cease making arrests in courthouses, the Office of Court Administration maintains that it cannot legally keep law enforcement out of public courthouses and that the protesting defense attorneys themselves are the ones causing turbulence in courthouse operations.

Dozens of attorneys from the Legal Aid Society and Queens Law Associates took to the street on Tuesday outside of Queens Criminal Court after attorneys spotted numerous ICE agents walking the halls of the courthouse.

The attorneys, who stood outside the courthouse for more than an hour, held signs and led chants, such as “ICE-free NYC.”

Ioana Calin of Legal Aid said ICE agents made two arrests in the courthouse on Tuesday; one of people detained, Calin said, was Hugo Gonzalez, an immigrant from Mexico who has been in the country for 12 years and who appeared before Queens Criminal Court Judge Toni Cimino for a misdemeanor assault charge.

Calin told the judge that she should set bail to ensure that Gonzalez stays out of ICE custody while he awaits the resolution of his criminal case, which she said is set to be dismissed in less than two weeks because the Queens District Attorney's Office has yet to file an information against Gonzalez.

But Assistant District Attorney Robert Hanophy argued against setting bail, saying that bail shouldn't be used to keep Gonzalez out of ICE custody and that the Queens DA's office would bring Gonzalez to court on a writ if he is taken in by ICE.

Cimino denied bail and Gonzalez was arrested.

“It's very disingenuous for the DA's office to try to say that we're using the courthouse to evade law enforcement when, in fact, it's the other way around,” Calin said in an interview after Gonzalez's arrest. “ICE is using the courthouses to deny people their due process rights.”

The walkout in Queens occurred the day after hundreds of public defenders from Legal Aid and The Bronx Defenders walked out of the Bronx Hall of Justice after ICE picked up one of Legal Aid's clients.

And on Friday, Legal Aid and Brooklyn Defender Services attorneys staged a walkout from Brooklyn Criminal Court after ICE agents picked up a 38-year-old Panamanian immigrant, according to media reports.

Earlier this year, ICE issued a formal policy on making arrests in federal, state and local courthouses, in which the agency said it would prioritize convicted criminals and persons considered to be public safety threats for arrests, but said it would also make arrests in special circumstances.

While walkouts have increased in frequency over the past week, public defenders in the city have arranged several walkouts over the last several months to register their discontent with both ICE and the OCA.

Additionally, Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark, Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez and Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. have publicly called on ICE to stop making arrests in or around courthouses, saying that the arrests may jeopardize public safety.

But OCA spokesman Lucian Chalfen said that ICE's courthouse-arrest policy came as the result of talks between the state court system and ICE and that the recent walkouts by public defenders have disrupted court operations.

“We continue to request that they treat all courthouses as sensitive locations, and will continue to raise these issues with ICE officials as we continue to ensure that any activity by outside law enforcement agencies does not cause disruption or compromise court operations,” Chalfen said.

With regard to the demonstration in Queens, Chalfen said that because some defense attorneys took part in the walkout “in lieu of representing their clients,” an arraignment part had to assign 10 incoming cases to 18B attorneys.

“These impromptu demonstrations while court is in session, only serve to disrupt court operations, which ironically is what the defender organizations claim ICE is responsible for doing,” he said.

Since the start of the year, ICE agents have made six arrests and 26 contacts with defendants in New York City courthouses, Chalfen said.