A federal judge ordered six women released from immigration detention after finding they were likely to prove a violation of due process. The women had been arrested after attending regular court hearings, a practice that has led to routine arrests of Bay Area asylum seekers and transfers to remote detention facilities. More than 2,000 people have been detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement across Northern California, Hawaii and U.S. Pacific territories. Once in detention, attorneys face difficulty reaching clients and filing habeas corpus petitions before transfers. The release marked the first large-scale freeing of women from Mesa Verde, and attorneys Jordan Wells and Victoria Petty obtained a temporary restraining order.
A U.S. District Court judge ordered six women released from immigration detention late Friday, the latest victory in attorneys' attempts to fight back against the routine arrests of Bay Area asylum seekers after they attend regular court hearings. The decision is a rare case of asylum seekers being released from detention after being transferred from San Francisco to remote facilities elsewhere in the state.
The decision late Friday was also the first large-scale release of women out of the Mesa Verde detention center, near Bakersfield, Calif., said immigration attorney Jordan Wells. Wells, along with colleague Victoria Petty of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, filed the habeas corpus petition on behalf of the women, arguing that the arrests and detentions violated due process rights.
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