Category
Post-Removal Detention
The Zadvydas docket: petitions seeking release from detention under 8 U.S.C. § 1231(a)(6) when removal is not significantly likely in the reasonably foreseeable future. With the 2025 enforcement push, this corner of the law is busier than it has been in two decades.
Abedi v. Choate: A Twenty-Three-Year Order of Supervision and a Recalcitrant Country
An Iranian national had lived for twenty-three years on supervised release after a 2002 conviction and a final removal order to “any country other than Iran.” Iran is on the recalcitrant-country list and refused travel documents in 2009. The District of Kansas ordered him released.
De Souza-Ferreira v. Decker: When CAT Withholding Meets Indefinite Detention
A Brazilian national who had been granted CAT withholding to Brazil could not be removed there. Government speculation about a third-country resettlement was insufficient under <em>Zadvydas</em> to justify nine months of continued detention. Habeas granted.
Daley v. Choate: EAJA Fees Are Available in Immigration Habeas
A 450-day detainee won her habeas petition; her counsel sought $18,553.92 in EAJA fees. The Tenth Circuit affirmed the award and held that § 2241 immigration habeas is a “civil action” within EAJA. The decision aligns the Tenth with the Second, Third, and Ninth Circuits and materially expands the bar’s capacity to take such cases.
Cruz Medina v. Noem: Re-Detention From Supervised Release and the Modern Zadvydas Docket
A Mexican national living for nearly five years on an Order of Supervision was re-detained at an ICE check-in. The District of Maryland ordered the government to justify continued detention, then enjoined his removal pending IJ review of his reasonable-fear determination.
Nguyen v. Hyde: Zadvydas Reaches the Pre-1995 Vietnamese Cohort, Again
A pre-1995 Vietnamese arrival re-detained after years on supervised release won habeas in the District of Massachusetts. Vietnam’s 2008 repatriation agreement excludes pre-1995 arrivals; on that record, the court held there was no significant likelihood of removal in the reasonably foreseeable future.
Martinez v. Clark: Habeas Review of Bond-Hearing Dangerousness Determinations Survives
On remand from the Supreme Court’s GVR after <em>Wilkinson v. Garland</em>, the Ninth Circuit held that federal courts retain jurisdiction in habeas to review the legal and constitutional components of immigration-judge dangerousness determinations — even though, on the merits, the petitioner lost.