Federal Judge Orders ICE to Release Detained Immigrants at Heightened Risk for COVID-19

We helped sue ICE to release 13 med-vulnerable ppl from detention in this COVID crisis. A judge agreed to release 4, proving it’s urgent, constitutionally mandated, and in the interest of public health. + link to press release https://t.co/hatr9LRaZ2

— Mano Raju (@ManoRajuPD) April 9, 2020

Good news for detained immigrants!  In a ruling yesterday, a federal court in San Francisco ordered the release of four men whose respective ages and medical conditions make them particularly vulnerable to COVID-19.

 U.S. Senior District Judge Maxine M. Chesney’s order to release the four immigrants from a pair of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention centers in California came in a lawsuit filed by the ACLU Foundations of Northern California and Southern California, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office, and Lakin & Wille LLP.

 Chesney wrote that “none of these [individuals] is in a position to meaningfully limit his exposure to COVID-19 while at Yuba or Mesa Verde.”

Bree Bernwanger, senior staff attorney at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, said that the judge’s decision “recognized that no immigration policy is more important than protecting human life.”

Plaintiffs Salmon Medina Calderon and Gennady V. Lavrus both have diabetes, while 82-year-old J. Elias Solario Lopez has a history of hypertension and kidney disease. Shelly Clements’ husband Charles Joseph is also a plaintiff and suffers from severe asthma. 

Immigrant detainees are fighting for release due to COVID-19 concerns in Massachusetts and many other states. 

KJ