Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Arlenid Dayan Ortiz-Avila, a native and citizen of Honduras who last entered the United States in January 2000, filed a pro se petition for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 on September 28, 2026, while detained at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center. He challenged ICE's September 15, 2026 revocation of his release and his re-detention, alleging that the government acted without prior notice or sufficient cause. The parties consented to proceed before a United States Magistrate Judge. The record showed that an immigration judge ordered him removed on March 10, 2011, but granted withholding of removal as to Honduras, and he was released on an order of supervision on or about March 15, 2011.
More than fifteen years later, on September 15, 2026, ICE arrested him at a check-in appointment and served him with a Notice of Revocation of Release and a Notice of Removal. The revocation notice stated that it was appropriate to enforce the removal order because ICE had the ability and means to effectuate removal, and added that his case was under review for removal to an alternate country. The separate removal notice stated only that ICE intended to remove him to a third country. On October 13, 2026, Respondents answered that re-detention was lawful because ICE intended to pursue third-country removal and because his detention remained presumptively reasonable under Zadvydas v. Davis.
The Court’s Holding
The court held that Respondents failed to demonstrate compliance with the governing revocation regulations and due process. Although ICE has authority to revoke supervised release in specified circumstances, 8 C.F.R. §§ 241.4 and 241.13 require a meaningful, individualized basis for revocation that gives the noncitizen notice of the grounds for re-detention and an opportunity to respond. The statements served here were vague and boilerplate: they identified no particular changed circumstances or facts specific to Ortiz-Avila. The court also found no indication that ICE had taken any steps toward removal, had determined which third country it intended to use, or had identified any noncompliance with his supervision conditions during more than fifteen years on release. The brevity of his detention did not resolve this distinct challenge, because Zadvydas's six-month presumption of reasonableness does not make detention mandatory when the revocation itself was unlawful.
The revocation independently failed under 8 C.F.R. § 241.4(l)(2). It was authorized by an 'Assistant Field Office Director' S. Hottya, a position the court found is not included among the officials qualifying as a Commissioner or district director under the cited regulations. Even assuming that official could act as a district director, Respondents offered no evidence of the required findings that revocation was in the public interest and that circumstances did not reasonably permit referral to the Executive Associate Commissioner. The court therefore granted the petition, ordered Respondents to release Ortiz-Avila immediately from immigration detention under the same conditions to which he was subject prior to his current detention, required a Notice of Release within three days, and directed entry of judgment.
Key Takeaways
- A revocation notice must provide an individualized basis rather than merely assert that ICE can enforce a removal order or that the case is under review for removal to an alternate country.
- An intention to explore removal to an unspecified third country did not justify re-detention after more than fifteen years on supervision, absent any showing of changed circumstances or noncompliance.
- The court found that the Assistant Field Office Director who authorized the revocation was not among the officials with regulatory authority to revoke release under 8 C.F.R. § 241.4(l)(2).
- Even an otherwise authorized district director would have needed to make the public-interest and referral findings required by the regulation before revoking release.
- Zadvydas's six-month presumption did not defeat a challenge focused on whether ICE lawfully revoked supervised release, because presumptively reasonable does not equate to mandatory.
Why It Matters
The decision treats ICE's release-revocation procedures as enforceable legal requirements, not optional administrative steps, and holds that failure to follow them renders re-detention unlawful and requires release. It separates the validity of a re-detention decision from the length of the resulting detention, making the adequacy of the notice, the identity of the revoking official, and the required findings central to the habeas analysis rather than the duration of custody.
The ordered remedy was immediate restoration of the prior supervised-release conditions, followed by a Notice of Release within three days and entry of judgment. The ruling resolved the petition on the revocation's procedural defects; it did not decide that removal could never occur or that a future revocation supported by lawful procedures would be barred.