Supreme court hears argument for relief for prolonged detention of immigrants

Demonstrators in front of the Supreme Court.

WHILE most of the attention of the news media centered on the Muslim ban being proposed by the Trump administration, another court case was heard earlier this month by the Supreme Court that affects the rights of detained immigrants.

The case, Jennings v. Rodriguez, challenges the government’s practice of detaining immigrants facing deportation proceedings for months or years without due process, including many long-term green-card holders and asylum seekers.

Ahilan Arulanantham, the son of  immigrants from Sri Lanka, will argued the case on behalf of the ACLU this Oct. 3, the traditional first day of the SCOTUS session.

This case challenges the government’s practice of detaining immigrants facing deportation proceedings for months or years without due process, including many long-term green-card holders and asylum seekers.

The Ninth Circuit ruled that the government must provide individualized bond hearings to assess danger and flight risk when detention exceeds six months, and every six months thereafter. The decision agreed with the ACLU, which represents plaintiffs.

Prolonged detention of such immigrants is a massive waste of taxpayer dollars, at a daily cost of $164 per detainee per day, and more than $2 billion a year. In America, no one should be locked up for months or years without a hearing to determine if their detention is even justified.

Ahilan Anulanantham

"The Rodriguez rule was actually an incredibly modest rule," Arulanantham explained. "It just says that if after six months your immigration case is still ongoing, you should get to ask a judge for the opportunity to be released."

The example of Ahilan Nadarajah is telling.

Repeatedly tortured as a member of an ethnic minority in his homeland Sri Lanka, he sought asylum in the United States in 2001.

The authorities detained him, and he remained behind bars for four years and five months as one release request after another was rejected. He eventually received American citizenship.

"What matters about this case is that you ve got people who are fighting their deportation, who are being locked up without bond hearings," Judy Rabinovitz, a member of the ACLU legal team, told AFP.

"Many of them have strong challenges to removal and if they had a bond hearing they wouldn t be found to be a danger of flight risk."

Then there's the story of Mark Hwang, a lawful permanent resident who was detained and separated from his twin daughters just after their birth:

Hwang has been a lawful permanent resident of the U.S. for nearly 30 years, having immigrated to the U.S. from South Korea at the age of nine. 

In 2013, upon returning home from the hospital with his prematurely born newborn twin daughters, Hwang was arrested by immigration officials in a home raid. He now faced both deportation and mandatory detention for a marijuana conviction he received 15 years prior to the immigration detention. Shackled and transported to Adelanto Detention Facility, Hwang was forced to leave his wife Sarah, a U.S. citizen, alone to care for their newborns and two-year-old son and to run their small business.

Detention was emotionally devastating for Hwang. He was unable to see his family for long periods. Even when they visited, he was not permitted to hold his children. He tried to have his marijuana conviction vacated, but was unable to appear at any criminal court hearings due to his detention.

Finally, after six months of detention, in July 2013 Hwang was given a Rodriguez hearing and ordered released on a $9,000 bond. Hwang later had his marijuana conviction vacated, and his removal proceedings were subsequently terminated in August 2014, restoring his lawful permanent resident status.

With cases averaging a reported 13 months, and conditions in detention centers facing criticism, the authorities have been under pressure to find a solution.

"Someone has to look at the detention and decide, is this a detention which remains reasonable?" said Arulanantham.

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