ACLU of Maine Sues Sanford for Withholding Records on ICE and CBP Collaboration

PORTLAND – The ACLU of Maine today sued the City of Sanford, the Sanford Police Department, and the Sanford Chief of Police for refusing to comply with a records request concerning Sanford Police Department’s cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). The ACLU of Maine sent 117 identical requests to other towns, cities, and agencies, and 112 responded in full.

The case, ACLU of Maine v. City of Sanford et al., was filed in the Cumberland County Superior Court.

The request, made under Maine’s Freedom of Access Act, sought incident reports about traffic stops that led to Sanford police turning a person over to ICE or CBP custody. Incident reports are public records that contain substantive information about police interactions with the public. For example, they include why police initiated a traffic stop, the facts that led police to call ICE or CBP, and how many people were turned over to federal custody because of the stop.

Sanford officials claimed they could not release incident reports because they contain classified information. Instead, they provided two call logs, which contain virtually no substantive information. The ACLU of Maine responded, sharing that the Maine Supreme Judicial Court has established that public records containing confidential information must be disclosed with appropriate redactions. Moreover, the call logs contained redactions of confidential information, indicating Sanford officials already knew this. Instead of engaging in good faith and producing the incident reports, Sanford officials suggested the ACLU of Maine seek a court order.

The lawsuit argues that incident reports are indisputably public records, and that Sanford is acting in bad faith. Sanford is improperly denying public records under Maine law, and the Law Court has established that when public records contain a combination of confidential and non-confidential information, the records must be disclosed with appropriate redactions.

Additionally, Sanford has acted in bad faith under Maine law in two ways. First, Sanford’s claim that incident reports cannot be disclosed has no legal basis and demonstrates clear opposition to public knowledge of Sanford officials’ actions. Second, by repeatedly instructing the ACLU of Maine to obtain a court order, Sanford has conceded that the incident reports can be disclosed. Under FOAA, the proper avenue for disclosure of records is for the agency to simply disclose records – not to force an appeal by arbitrarily withholding them.

“Over one hundred other agencies in Maine have followed the law and complied with identical requests for public records,” said Anahita Sotoohi, a staff attorney at the ACLU of Maine. “Public records are a vital way for people to know what their government is doing and why. As federal agents continue to abuse their power and violate people’s rights, it is crucial for Maine’s people to understand how local officials are engaging. We can only hold our government accountable to the people it is supposed to serve when we know what public officials are doing.”

Throughout 2025 and 2026, the ACLU of Maine has submitted dozens of records requests to better understand how state and local law enforcement in Maine may be supporting federal immigration operations. The records show that many law enforcement agencies routinely detain people for simple traffic infractions until ICE or CBP arrive and take the person into custody. These types of stops can violate the Fourth Amendment because officers should only detain people as long as necessary to address the initial reason for the stop – not to wait hours for a federal agent to arrive.

Read the lawsuit and exhibits online here.