A US federal judge on Saturday (January 31) ordered the release of a five-year-old boy and his father from a Texas family detention centre after they were detained by immigration officers during a January raid in Minneapolis, Minnesota, that sparked nationwide outrage.
The boy, Liam Conejo Ramos, and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, had been held for more than a week at a facility in Dilley, Texas, after being taken into custody outside their home in suburban Minneapolis.
Viral image sparks national outrage
Images of Liam — wearing a blue bunny hat, a plaid coat and carrying a Spider-Man backpack — went viral after showing the preschooler standing in his snowy driveway as armed federal agents looked on.
Judge slams deportation quotas
In a blistering three-page order, US District Judge Fred Biery condemned the administration of President Donald Trump, saying the detentions stemmed from an aggressive push to meet deportation targets.
“The case has its genesis in the ill-conceived and incompetently-implemented government pursuit of daily deportation quotas, apparently even if it requires traumatizing children,” Biery wrote.
School district alleges child used as ‘bait’
School district officials said Liam was used as “bait” to draw family members out of the home. They said another adult inside the house “begged the agents to let him take care of the small child and was refused,” after which ICE officers took both the father and son into custody.
The Department of Homeland Security disputed that account, saying Conejo Arias “fled on foot” when approached and accused him of abandoning the child.
‘Orderly and humane’ process required
Biery acknowledged that the father and son could still face deportation under US. immigration law but said any such outcome must follow lawful and humane procedures.
“Ultimately, Petitioners may, because of the arcane United States immigration system, return to their home country, involuntarily or by self-deportation,” he wrote. “But that result should occur through a more orderly and humane policy than currently in place.”
ICE under scrutiny
ICE is also facing intense criticism after a January 22 incident in Minneapolis in which a two-year-old toddler, identified as C.R.T.V., was taken into federal custody along with her father, Elvis Tipan-Echeverria, when agents approached their vehicle. The family alleges that officers entered their backyard and driveway without a warrant, broke a window while the child was inside and would not let the father hand the toddler to her mother. They also noted that the ICE vehicle did not have a child car seat. Despite a court order requiring the child’s release, she was flown to Texas and later returned to her mother.
Both the incidents come amid heightened tensions after the fatal shooting of Minneapolis resident Renee Nicole Good by an ICE agent earlier in January and the subsequent killing of ICU nurse Alex Pretti by a US Border Patrol agent. Those deaths have fueled widespread protests and demands for accountability over federal law-enforcement actions in the city.
