A circuit judge was arrested Friday by the Federal Bureau of Investigation inside a Milwaukee courthouse and charged with helping an undocumented immigrant avoid arrest after he appeared in her courtroom.
FBI Director Kash Patel posted on X Friday, saying that authorities believe Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan “intentionally misdirected federal agents away” from the man, Mexican immigrant Eduardo Flores Ruiz.
Attorney General Pam Bondi confirmed the arrest.
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“I can confirm that our @FBI agents just arrested Hannah Dugan–a county judge in Milwaukee–for allegedly helping an illegal alien avoid an arrest by @ICEgov,” she wrote.
“No one is above the law,” Bondi added.
A criminal complaint obtained by the Daily Beast states that Dugan, 65, was charged with obstruction and has been released on her own recognizance. If convicted, she could face a sentence of up to five years in federal prison.
Flores Ruiz, a Mexican national who was previously deported in 2013, was at the courthouse for a pre-trial conference on three misdemeanor battery charges when Immigration and Customs Enforcement swooped in, Dugan’s complaint said.
An FBI agent alleged Dugan was “visibly upset” and “confrontational” toward six federal agents—two from the FBI, two from the DEA, one from Border Patrol, and one from ICE—who were dressed in plainclothes to make an arrest in “as low-key and safe of a manner as possible.”
The complaint said Dugan learned of ICE’s presence at the courthouse from her clerk, who appeared to have been tipped off by a public defender. The complaint claims that Dugan “commented that the situation was absurd” and left her bench to confront the federal agents in a hallway and demand proof of a warrant.
The FBI claims agents showed an arrest warrant to Dugan in the hallway. She is accused of pushing back, saying it was insufficient and that the agents needed to discuss the matter with the courthouse’s chief judge, so they did. That is when Dugan is accused of abruptly adjourning Flores Ruiz’s hearing—allegedly without giving notice to the state—and escorting him through a “jury door.”
This maneuver allowed Flores Ruiz to skip the public hallway where federal law enforcement was waiting so he could “avoid his arrest,” the complaint said.
Flores Ruiz, whose hearing was set to take place on the building’s sixth floor, briskly reached an elevator with his attorney, the FBI said, but he was spotted by one of the agents and was followed. The complaint alleges he reached the ground floor of the courthouse and “sprinted” away on the street in downtown Milwaukee.
The FBI said Flores Ruiz ran the length of the courthouse before he was apprehended and placed in handcuffs. The complaint stated that the entire ordeal lasted approximately 22 minutes.
Patel quickly deleted his post about Dugan’s arrest, but it is not clear why.
“Just NOW, the FBI arrested Judge Hannah Dugan out of Milwaukee, Wisconsin on charges of obstruction—after evidence of Judge Dugan obstructing an immigration arrest operation last week,” Patel wrote. “We believe Judge Dugan intentionally misdirected federal agents away from the subject to be arrested in her courthouse, Eduardo Flores Ruiz, allowing the subject—an illegal alien—to evade arrest.”
Flores Ruiz appeared before Dugan for a pre-trial conference on April 18. Federal agents arrived at the Milwaukee County Courthouse on the same date with an arrest warrant, the FBI said.
Agents then went to Dugan’s courtroom on the sixth floor, where they were asked for a warrant, according to an email Chief Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Carl Ashley sent to other district court judges. The April 18 email did not name the defendant.
“They were asked to go to Chief Judge’s office. They complied. They presented a warrant, which we copied,” Ashley’s email said, adding that agents were asked to wait until the hearing had finished.
Ashley said their actions “were consistent with our draft policies, but we’re still in the process of conferring on the draft.”
Dugan, however, reportedly responded to the email, alleging that “a warrant was not presented in the hallway on the 6th floor.”
“Thankfully, our agents chased down the perp on foot and he’s been in custody since, but the Judge’s obstruction created increased danger to the public,” Patel’s post said.
Dugan is in her ninth year as a Milwaukee County Circuit Court judge, an elected position. Her current judicial term expires in 2028.
