U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement removed dozens of its detainees from the Cumberland County Jail and the Department of Homeland Security canceled its contract to hold prisoners at the jail after the sheriff criticized ICE’s tactics.

Sheriff Kevin Joyce said ICE officials called his office Thursday to say they were moving all of their detainees out of the Portland facility. Joyce said about 50 detainees were removed, though he did not have an exact total.

The transfers came just hours after Joyce skewered the federal agency’s practices, calling them “bush league” for using so many agents to detain one person, a Cumberland County corrections officer, and leaving his running vehicle on the side of the road.

Then on Friday, Homeland Security said it is canceling its agreement to hold detainees at the Cumberland County Jail.

Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin cited the corrections officer’s arrest on Wednesday, saying it was “shocking” to see the jail employ a “lawbreaker.”

“Following learning the county jail employed an illegal alien, ICE will no longer house illegal aliens at the facility,” McLaughlin said in a written statement on Friday. “We could not, in good conscience, continue to partner with a law enforcement organization that flagrantly violated our nation’s immigration laws.”

McLaughlin identified the corrections officer as Emanuel Ludovic Mbuangi Landila, saying he is an Angolan who illegally crossed the southern border in 2019.

On Thursday, Joyce said the officer’s background check came up “squeaky clean” when he was hired in February 2024, and that his paperwork showed he was allowed to work in the country until April 2029.

ICE Deputy Assistant Director Patricia Hyde reprimanded Joyce for his remarks, saying in a written statement Friday night that he “chose to turn on his law enforcement brethren and smear the brave men and women of ICE” instead of “owning up to his own department’s failures.”

“While Sheriff Kevin Joyce was busy grandstanding and attacking ICE, our officers were risking their lives to keep Cumberland County safe, arresting dangerous criminals and upholding the law,” Hyde said, later adding: “Sheriff Joyce should clean up his own house before criticizing those who actually protect our communities.”

In court records, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maine said it wasn’t aware of what ICE had done until Friday afternoon and admitted that the agency violated judges’ orders not to move some detainees.

CRUCIAL SOURCE OF FUNDING

Joyce said the corrections officer who ICE detained did not have a criminal record. He was driving in Portland’s Bayside neighborhood Wednesday night when he was stopped by several agents who pulled him from the vehicle.

The agents took him into custody and left the scene in the span of about three minutes, a witness said, leaving his car running on the side of the road.

Asked Friday if ICE’s decision to move the detainees felt retaliatory, Joyce replied, “I’ll leave it up to the public to determine whether or not that is the case. It seems like an immediate response, right?”

The federal government pays the Cumberland County Jail $150 per day for each federal detainee held at the facility, including those who were brought in by ICE. The jail typically holds about 60 people for federal agencies, Joyce has said previously.

In November, Cumberland County commissioners voted against a proposal to remove ICE detainees from the jail despite months of calls from protesters to end the contract.

At the time, commissioners said the deal is a crucial source of funding. But county officials confirmed Friday that in the past few months, the federal government hasn’t been paying them.

Stephen Gorden, chair of the Cumberland County commissioners, said he doesn’t know how much money is unaccounted for, but he’s concerned about the missed payments. He suspects that the board will soon be alerting federal legislators to the issue.

“We’re like any other government: If we don’t have funds, we can’t operate,” Gorden said.

It’s unclear which federal agency hasn’t paid. The contract is with the U.S. Marshals Service, but a spokesperson for that agency said Friday that it is only responsible for a share of the total payment, which “is current and up to date.”

“Any individuals held on behalf of other federal agencies, such as ICE, would be funded and paid for by those agencies or other entities directly, not through the (Marshals Service),” spokesperson Ryan Guay wrote in an email. “Given the statements you’ve referenced from county leadership, we are concerned and will continue reviewing the matter.”

ICE did not address questions about the funding discrepancy in its response Friday.

LATE-NIGHT PETITIONS

Federal judges ordered earlier this week that ICE refrain from transferring out of Maine several detainees who have filed petitions in U.S. District Court alleging they’re being held in violation of their constitutional rights.

In response to ICE’s “direct violation” of those orders, U.S. District Judge Stacey Neumann and U.S. District Judge John Woodcock ordered on Friday that at least three detainees immediately be released. It wasn’t clear Friday night if they had been let go.

That includes Eyidi Ambila, who was supposed to be protected from being transferred by a court order that Woodcock signed almost nine months ago.

On Friday, Neumann granted Ambila’s petition and ordered his immediate release, barring ICE from detaining him again.

Abigail Lima Da Silva O’Leary, a Brazilian woman who is married to a U.S. citizen, had been held at the Cumberland County Jail since her arrest by ICE in Massachusetts in October, according to a petition seeking her release.

Woodcock had temporarily barred ICE from moving O’Leary out of Maine on Wednesday.

The judge has now ordered that ICE release her immediately, “in light of the Government’s representation that Abigail Lima Da Silva O’Leary was transferred to Massachusetts in direct violation of this Court’s Order.”

ICE also is not allowed to detain her again until Woodcock makes a final ruling in the case.

And Neumann ordered that Tong Qi Lu, a 56-year-old native of China, be immediately released Friday night from the Plymouth County Correctional Center in Massachusetts, where he was sent despite Neumann’s previous order requiring ICE to keep him in Maine.

Lu’s attorney, Oriana Farnham, said in a petition that Lu left China when he was about 20 years old, and that he has called the U.S. home for more than 30 years. He was living in Bangor, where he owns a restaurant, according to court records.

Lu was taken into custody in April after a Maine State Police trooper stopped him while he was searching for supplies at a scrapyard with the property owner’s permission, according to court filings.

“After checking Mr. Lu’s driver’s license, the trooper informed him, ‘You’ve got trouble — ICE wants you,’” Farnham wrote.

The trooper took Lu to his restaurant to hug his family members, records state, before Lu was transferred to ICE custody and moved to Portland.

ICE determined in 2020 that his removal to China “was not likely in the foreseeable future” and that he posed no risk to the community, Farnham wrote in court records. She said Lu has been complying with ICE’s conditions of release for the last five years, and that a petition for lawful permanent status is still pending.

Staff Writer Drew Johnson contributed to this story.