A federal judge in Texas this week refused to dismiss a lawsuit brought against Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents by the children of a woman who was murdered by her abusive ex-boyfriend in Mexico after being deported.
Judge Andrew Hanen said that the litigation can proceed, ruling that the plaintiff’s claims about due process violations aren’t without merit.
“Even aliens who have entered the United States unlawfully are assured the protections of the Fifth Amendment due process clause,” wrote Hanen.
Hanen also ruled that the status of the defendants’ motion to dismiss the case based on “qualified immunity” will be decided after it is determined if allegations “will be supported by evidence sufficient to raise a question of fact.” The statutory shield protects federal officials from civil suits for official acts.
The murdered woman, named in the lawsuit as Laura S., was deported in 2009, after the car she was riding in with two other people in Pharr, Texas, was pulled over by a police officer. After failing to produce immigration documents, she and two passengers were taken to an ICE center, where Laura “was weeping and anguished when she spoke with Defendants, and informed them that she feared for her life is she returned to Mexico.”
Although she told officials that her ex-boyfriend would do harm to her, “Defendants did not question Laura S. about her expressed fears nor attempt to verify or evaluate her risk of harm,” Judge Hanen noted.
Instead, they “forcefully demanded she sign” a statement declaring she was leaving the country voluntarily, and then drove her Hidalgo-Reynosa International Bridge between the US and Mexico.
“Laura S. wept on the way to the bridge, telling Defendant [Customs and Border Patrol Agent Ramiro] Garza that she would not survive the week in Mexico.”
The defendants failed to give her time to read the document, Hanen ruled, and did not ensure that she knew about her rights, including “the right to seek asylum or the right to a hearing before an immigration judge.”
Of note, Hanen was the federal judge who in February enjoined President Obama’s November 2014 executive order on immigration.
Earlier this week, the release of a Government Accountability Office report raised questions about systemic due process violations by immigration officials. The investigation found that the Department of Homeland Security deported 93 percent of unaccompanied Mexican children under the age of 14 “without documenting the basis for decisions”–a likely violation of federal anti-human trafficking laws.
Read Hanen’s order, courtesy of Courthouse News, here.
