A Grand Rapids police captain asked ICE to check a US citizen Marine veteran's status; the city later paid $190,000 to settle.
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What happened
Jilmar Ramos-Gomez, a US citizen and Marine veteran with PTSD, was arrested by Grand Rapids police in November 2018. The ACLU of Michigan says off-duty GRPD captain Curt VanderKooi, seeing news coverage, asked ICE to check his status based only on his name and appearance; ICE lodged a detainer and he was held about three days before release (ICE said at the time that he had claimed in verbal statements to be a foreign national). The Grand Rapids City Commission approved a $190,000 settlement in November 2019; the ACLU says VanderKooi was suspended without pay, and in August 2019 GRPD adopted a policy barring officers from questioning immigration status or contacting ICE for civil immigration enforcement. A separate Federal Tort Claims Act suit against the United States settled in November 2022.
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