NASHVILLE (AP) - Two rights groups have joined a Nashville attorney's lawsuit, seeking to stop the Davidson County Sheriff's Office immigration enforcement program.

The Southern Poverty Law Center and the National Immigration Project of the National Lawyers Guild have filed a brief in U.S. District Court in Nashville in support of a lawsuit by attorney Elliott Ozment, according to The Tennessean (http://bit.ly/oa6jI3). The lawsuit asks the court to stop the sheriff's office from screening incoming jail inmates for their residency status and flagging to immigration authorities any who are not legal residents of the U.S.

On Friday, Ozment asked the court for a ruling of summary judgment.

Ozment argues the sheriff's office lost its enforcement powers when the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County was formed in 1963.