On the one-month anniversary of a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid in Wilder, 15 detained individuals were released from Idaho prisons, with a senior U.S. district judge for Idaho citing a lack of due process and unlawful confinement.
Families gathered at Mountain Home outside the Elmore County Jail as eight individuals were released Wednesday night, as reported by KTVB. The remaining seven individuals were released from other state facilities in eastern and western Idaho.
The raid took place on Oct. 19 at La Catedral Arena horse racetrack in Wilder. Approximately 400 attendees were spending their Sunday watching races when the FBI came to carry out arrest warrants for five individuals who allegedly organized illegal horse-racing betting. In carrying out four of the arrest warrants, the FBI invited 200 law enforcement personnel from several agencies including the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Despite a lack of affiliation with criminal activity, ICE officers zip-tied and interrogated a mix of citizens, legal residents and non-citizens, according to witnesses.
At one point, rubber bullets were fired by officers. Witnesses have also claimed that children were zip-tied and had guns pointed at them.
In a statement provided to the Idaho Press following the raid, the FBI said that “reports suggesting young children were zip-tied or hit with rubber bullets during the October 19 FBI-led operation in Wilder are completely false.”
This corrected a previous statement that omitted “young” children.
Many detainees remained in ICE custody without any criminal charges according to Ramirez-Smith Law. A majority of the individuals were released that night or the following day, with 105 remaining in custody on Oct. 21 due to their residential status, according to ICE.
Exactly a month after the raid, U.S. District Court Judge Lynn Winmill approved the release of 15 individuals currently being held in Idaho. Winmill approved the detainees’ habeas corpus filings, which petition a court to review an individual’s unlawful detention or imprisonment.
A memorandum obtained by the Idaho Press details Winmill’s decision to release one of the detainees. For this individual, the decision came in part due to his status as a decades-long U.S. resident with no criminal record.
“The government has identified no information establishing (he) poses a danger or flight risk,” Winmill wrote. “Its only apparent interest in detaining (him) — which imposes additional fiscal and administrative burdens — is to fulfill an arrest quota of 3,000 immigration arrests per day set by the current administration.”
This quota set by President Donald Trump was first mentioned in May, by White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller on Fox News, according to the Associated Press.
The memorandum went on to state that the individual was held without a bond hearing, violating their Fifth Amendment right to due process. In addition, the individual was detained alongside convicted criminals. The conditions they were held in were “indistinguishable from criminal incarceration” with a loss of contact with family, loss of ability to work and lack of privacy, according to the memorandum.
To rectify the unlawful month-long detainment without a bond hearing, Winmill wrote that the detainee should be released, citing similar decisions that have been made by courts nationwide in recent months.
A native of Blackfoot and 1974 graduate from Idaho State University, Winmill also attended Harvard Law School before moving back to east Idaho in 1979. He was appointed a United States District Judge for the District of Idaho by then-President Bill Clinton in August 1995.
The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment by publication deadline.
Attorney Nikki Ramirez-Smith told the Idaho Press Thursday that the 15 releases are a part of a larger win for immigrant rights. Ramirez-Smith Law has represented many of the individuals who were detained in the October raid.
“Immigration is losing, DHS is losing across the country,” Ramirez-Smith said.
Also referenced in the memorandum, Ramirez-Smith said recent orders by Trump have shaken decades of precedent set by immigration courts and ICE.
In the Matter of Yajure Hurtado ruling, the Board of Immigration Appeals stripped judges of the ability to hold bond hearings for illegal residents, as referenced in Winmill’s memorandum. The Hurtado ruling took place in September of this year and leaves no distinction between those caught at the U.S. border and those who have resided in the country for years.
“DHS has now abandoned (its adherence to due process), sweeping all noncitizens who entered without inspection into (a) detention net — regardless of how long they have lived here,” Winmill wrote. “…Matter of Yajure Hurtado has trapped thousands in detention without bond hearings, including long-term residents with no criminal records.”
However, recent rulings have gone against the Hurtado ruling — including the release of the Wilder detainees.
“Dozens of district courts across the nation — with more each day — have rejected DHS’s expansion of … mandatory detention to noncitizens already residing here,” Winmill wrote. “Only two courts, as far as the court is aware, have sided with the government. This court joins the overwhelming majority.”
Ramirez-Smith said the individuals released represent a mixed-bag of residential statuses and will proceed through immigration hearings by the Portland Immigration Court.
“They’ll just get to do it with their families, and they’ll get an actual hearing on it, which is how our country has operated forever,” she said.
With federal cuts and the firing of judges, Ramirez-Smith anticipates the proceedings will take years. She expects the following weeks to be a time for families to stabilize and reconnect. The month-long confinement has led to lost salaries and unpaid bills.
Advocates of the detainees have celebrated this win and are looking to continue work. The American Civil Liberties Union of Idaho Foundation has been outspoken against the detainments and provided the following statement.
“Everyone at the ACLU of Idaho rejoiced upon hearing that 15 people were freed on successful habeas corpus petitions,” ACLU Communications Director Rebecca DeLeon wrote. “Thankfully, justice allowed those people to return to their families. We are investigating ways to hold the government accountable for the harms they inflicted on all the families impacted by the Wilder raid.”