UPDATE, 09/16/2026:
The United States federal court for California’s Central District has granted, in part, a motion for a preliminary injunction on warrantless arrests.
The decision will impact the counties of Los Angeles, Orange, Ventura, San Bernardino, Riverside, Santa Barbara, and San Luis Obispo.
Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong found and agreed with the plaintiffs that “deportation officers have been instructed that they may conduct warrantless arrests of individuals without consideration of the individual’s likelihood of escape.”
In order for a warrantless arrest to be legal, agents have to conduct and document a flight risk assessment. According to ACLU SoCal, about 80% of the 113 arrest records that have been reviewed lack this key escape risk assessment or largely rely on boilerplate language, referring to standardized, repetitive text used in arrest narratives.