(C) El Paso Matters.org
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County won’t pay DA Bill Hicks’ legal fees in SB 4 lawsuit naming him as defendant [1]
['Cindy Ramirez', 'More Cindy Ramirez', 'El Paso Matters']
Date: 2024-02-06
El Paso District Attorney Bill Hicks is asking the county to use general fund dollars to pay for an attorney to represent him in a lawsuit filed against him by the county itself.
El Paso County and the ACLU in December filed a lawsuit challenging the legality of Senate Bill 4, a new state law that makes it a state crime to illegally cross the border into Texas from Mexico. The lawsuit names as defendants Hicks and Steven McCraw, the director of the Texas Department of Public Safety.
On Monday, the El Paso County Commissioners Court unanimously voted down using money reserved for legal services in its general fund – taxpayer dollars used for day-to-day county operations – to pay for Hicks’ legal representation.
The County Attorney’s Office often represents county employees sued in their official capacity. But Hicks is technically a state employee – district attorney for the 34th Judicial District that includes El Paso, Culberson and Hudspeth counties – although his salary is paid by both the state and the county.
County Attorney Jo Anne Bernal told commissioners that the law doesn’t prohibit the county from paying Hicks’ legal costs if they determine there’s a public purpose to do so – but that it doesn’t require it to do so, either.
Hicks said he agreed to be represented by the state Attorney General’s Office in the lawsuit’s initial proceedings. But he said that he and the AG’s office had “divergent” views and that he would be better served by a private attorney.
“I feel that my interests are local and I want the local attorney to represent me and the people of El Paso and the counties that I represent,” Hicks told El Paso Matters on Tuesday.
Hicks on Monday said he was not a civil litigator and was “not sure exactly how to proceed” with the briefs due in the lawsuit or injunctions filed since. He said the federal court is mandating in-person hearings in San Antonio in the case, which he would have to attend.
Hicks retained El Paso attorney Francisco Ortega to represent him.
Also during the county meeting, Hicks said that he would take money from the county’s Chapter 59 fund – which comprises proceeds from police seizures and forfeitures – to pay for his legal representation. A portion of those proceeds are allocated to the DA’s office, Hicks noted.
But he said that would mean dipping into funds that go to specialty courts such as drug or veterans courts, which receive some money from Chapter 59 proceeds allocated to the District Attorney’s Office. Hicks said the fund has a projected income of about $400,000 for the fiscal year and that 10% of it is “donated” to specialty courts.
Commissioner Carlos Leon during the meeting said he felt Hicks was “threatening” to cut funds from other programs by “refusing” to work with an attorney from the Attorney General’s Office. Leon added that he didn’t want to put Hicks’ representation on local taxpayers instead of taking the offer from the state to represent him.
“I’m very dissatisfied with his reasoning,” Leon said before making a motion that the county not pay for Hicks’ legal representation in the lawsuit. The court voted 5-0 in favor of Leon’s motion.
Hicks responded to Leon saying he was sorry that he felt he was threatening to cut programs. “I was not. It was merely an understanding of where that money is going to come from,” he said.
Pointing out that there was an election forthcoming, Commissioner Sergio Coronado said he was “concerned how the court’s decision may look politically.”
All of the commissioners, as well as County Judge Ricardo Samaniego, are Democrats.
A Republican appointed to the position by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in December 2022, Hicks is running to keep his seat in the November general election. He will face the candidate who wins the Democratic bid for the position in the March 5 primary.
Two commissioner seats are also up for grabs in this year’s elections: Leon in Precinct 1 is retiring and not seeking reelection; while Precinct 3 Commissioner Iliana Holguin is seeking reelection.
When the ACLU lawsuit was filed in December, Hicks in a press conference at the time said he fully anticipated the lawsuit but was surprised to have been named a defendant by his own county government.
Hicks told El Paso Matters that his role is not to advocate for or against SB 4, saying that he would follow the law in the books at the time and evaluate any cases that reached his office on a case-by-case basis.
“I think that it’s very important to understand that this is not a political position for me,” Hicks told El Paso Matters. “It’s not a Republican or Democrat stance. And that’s another reason why I feel like I need my own independent representation, to get me out of this political battle. I don’t think that the District Attorney’s Office should be entering into a political battle, especially in an election season.”
The lawsuit argues that SB 4 violates the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution and bypasses federal law in the enforcement of immigration matters, including the prosecution of those arrested under the state law. It was filed on behalf of El Paso County alongside the Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center and American Gateways, a nonprofit organization that assists migrants and immigrants.
The ACLU of Texas and the Texas Civil Rights Projects on Jan. 12 filed for a preliminary injunction in federal court to block SB 4 from taking effect on March 5. A hearing on the injunction is set for Feb. 15 in Austin.
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[1] Url:
https://elpasomatters.org/2024/02/06/el-paso-da-bill-hicks-sb-4-lawsuit-county-who-pays-legal-fees/
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