Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Raulyn Tejeda Carrion, a citizen of the Dominican Republic, entered the United States without inspection in 2019. He later married a U.S. citizen, who filed a family-based visa petition on his behalf, and he submitted his own asylum application. After learning of decades-old Dominican arrest records — a 1999 incarceration for rape and a 2010 homicide arrest — ICE set up a ruse, obtaining his phone number and arranging a fake meeting for a job estimate. When Tejeda Carrion arrived on February 11, 2026, ICE arrested him and served a Notice to Appear placing him in removal proceedings, with a hearing date set for March 24, 2026.
Rather than waiting for those proceedings to conclude, the government transported Tejeda Carrion to the Dominican Republic and handed him to Dominican authorities, who promptly released him, telling him he had no criminal record there — a point the government did not dispute. Having mistakenly removed him before his case was resolved, the Department of Homeland Security granted him parole back into the United States under INA § 212(d)(5), valid through May 11, 2026. He flew back and presented his parole document at the Miami airport on May 6, 2026, where he was immediately detained again. By the time of this ruling he had been held more than four months, despite requesting a bond hearing in June, with the government insisting his detention was mandatory under 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2)(A).
The Court’s Holding
The court agreed with Tejeda Carrion that his detention was unlawful, though on narrower grounds than his broadest arguments. It held that at the time of his original February 2026 arrest, he was an alien present in the United States without admission or parole who had been apprehended in the interior — a category governed by 8 U.S.C. § 1226(a), not § 1225(b), under the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Rodriguez Vazquez v. Bostock. Section 1226(a) and its regulations guarantee detained noncitizens substantial procedural protections, including arrest on a valid warrant, notice of the basis for continued detention, an initial custody determination by an immigration officer, and ultimately a bond hearing.
The government, the court found, never argued or offered evidence that it provided Tejeda Carrion with any of that process — and notably did not even address the extraordinary circumstances of his case, including his mistaken deportation mid-proceedings or the fact that his original arrest rested on decades-old, unverified foreign criminal allegations. Where the government fails entirely to provide the statutory process due under § 1226(a), courts in this district have held that the proper remedy is not merely ordering compliance going forward but immediate release. The court ordered Tejeda Carrion released at once, while making clear that if the government wishes to re-detain him, it must this time provide the full process § 1226(a) requires.
Key Takeaways
- Using an undercover ruse to lure a noncitizen into an arrest does not, by itself, change the applicable detention statute — someone apprehended in the interior without admission remains subject to § 1226(a), not mandatory detention under § 1225(b).
- Mistakenly removing someone before their removal proceedings conclude, and then allowing them back on a parole document, does not reset the government’s obligation to follow § 1226(a)’s procedural protections upon re-detention.
- When the government cannot show it ever gave a detainee a valid warrant, notice, an initial custody determination, or a bond hearing, courts are ordering immediate release rather than simply directing the government to hold a belated hearing.
- Unverified, decades-old foreign arrest records were not enough, standing alone, for the government to defend its detention decision once challenged in habeas proceedings.
Why It Matters
This case is a vivid illustration of how procedural failures — not just substantive detention disputes — can doom the government’s custody of a noncitizen. The extraordinary facts (a ruse arrest, an erroneous mid-case deportation, and a second detention upon return) make this a notable addition to the body of Eastern District case law on when immediate release, rather than a mere do-over hearing, is the appropriate remedy.
For immigration attorneys, the decision reinforces that documenting exactly what process the government failed to provide — warrant, notice, custody determination, bond hearing — can be decisive in securing a client’s release outright rather than just a hearing date.