A Honduran immigrant waited too long to sue over claims that a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent raped her repeatedly for seven years, a Connecticut federal court ruled for the second time, once again finding in favor of the defendants after the Second Circuit revived the case in 2023.

U.S. District Judge Kari A. Dooley wrote in an order Monday that the plaintiff known as Jane Doe "has not established the prerequisites of equitable tolling" of the statute of limitations on her claims against ICE, former officer Wilfredo Rodriguez, the federal government, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and two senior DHS officials. Last August, the Second Circuit reversed a different judge's grant of summary judgment to the defendants and ordered an evidentiary hearing on whether Doe could benefit from tolling, but Judge Dooley found she could not.

"Plaintiff testified that she knew that she had a potential cause of action the first time she was sexually assaulted by Rodriguez in 2007," but didn't pursue legal action until 2018, Judge Dooley wrote. "The court finds that plaintiff is an intelligent and resourceful person. She understood the options available to her (even having threatened Rodriguez with disclosure) but opted to remain silent."

Under the Federal Tort Claims Act, Doe "was required to present her claim in writing to DHS within two years of accrual of her claim," the order said, while she had to bring her claim against Rodriguez within three years. She did not demonstrate the "reasonable diligence" necessary to let her bring her claims outside the statutory window, Judge Dooley found.

During the May 7 evidentiary hearing, the parties presented evidence that showed Doe unlawfully entered the U.S. in 2000, then was subject to an order of removal after she failed to appear at an immigration hearing, the order said. In 2006, she went to the ICE office in Hartford — where she met Rodriguez — to inquire about her brother, and offered "to become a source of information for ICE, believing that doing so would prevent her and her family from being deported."

Doe was ordered to report to the agency regularly, and provided information for the next six years, the order said.

"Plaintiff testified that beginning in 2007, defendant Rodriguez regularly sexually assaulted and abused her in various locations, including at a hotel, in a government vehicle, and in his home," the order said. "This abuse continued until 2014, and plaintiff testified that defendant Rodriguez continuously threatened her and her family with deportation or violence if she disclosed his sexual abuse."

The Second Circuit opinion noted that Doe accused Rodriguez of raping her at gunpoint and claimed that when she went to his home to try to break off contact with him, he heated a thin piece of metal on his stove and burned her abdomen, leaving three permanent scars.

Doe filed an administrative tort claim with DHS in July 2018 and brought her complaint in Connecticut federal court in October 2019.

Judge Dooley's order names several authority and healthcare figures that Doe could have told about the alleged abuse, but did not, including the police officers who responded to two incidents of violence after someone accused her of being an ICE informant; another ICE officer whom she said she trusted; her immigration attorney; and a workers' compensation attorney.

Doe also did not tell a mental health treatment provider who was treating her for depression, which she told the court was caused by the abuse, the order said.

"While this evidence undermines plaintiff's claims regarding the abuse, it also demonstrates that she had access to yet another confidential sounding board to whom she could safely disclose the abuse," the order said.

After she stopped working with ICE in 2012, she started informing to the FBI, where she also did not disclose the alleged abuse, the order said.

In May 2018, agents from the DHS Office of Professional Responsibility interviewed Doe about her father's asylum application, and she told them about the alleged abuse, according to the order. She then asked "what benefit she would receive in return for telling them" more information, Judge Dooley wrote.

The order said that Doe's claim that she feared Rodriguez was not enough to explain her silence, especially since their contact ended in 2014.

U.S. Circuit Judge Sarah A.L. Merriam granted summary judgment to the defendants in March 2022 when was still a district judge in Connecticut. She was not on the Second Circuit panel that ordered a remand.

"Sexual abuse perpetrated by an ICE agent against an undocumented immigrant may give the assailant's threats a similarly immobilizing effect as those of a prison official against someone in their custody," the panel said in its published opinion. "With these dynamics in mind, the district court could reasonably find on this record that years of violent sexual abuse and threats to Doe's life gave Doe a 'specific and credible basis to fear retaliation' from Rodriguez and thereby constituted an extraordinary circumstance."

Judge Dooley wrote that the defendants had provided "substantial evidence undermining the veracity" of Doe's claims, but because she failed to satisfy the reasonable diligence requirement, the court did not need to decide if she demonstrated an extraordinary circumstance.

Counsel for Doe and Rodriguez, and representatives for ICE, DHS and the U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday.

Doe is represented by George W. Kramer and Debra D. Klingsberg of the Law Offices of Kramer & Klingsberg.

Rodriguez is represented by Trent A. LaLima and Virginia M. Gillette of Santos & LaLima PC.

The government is represented by Eve A. Piemonte of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts.

The case is Doe v. U.S. et al., case number 3:19-cv-01649, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut.

--Additional reporting by Carolina Bolado. Editing by Adam LoBelia.