Martinez v. McAleenan

• Decision Date: 14 June 2019
• Docket Number: 19-cv-2627 (NSR)
• Citation: 385 F.Supp.3d 349
• Parties: Luis MARTINEZ, Petitioner, v. Kevin K. MCALEENAN, Acting Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS); Thomas Decker, New York Field Office Director, US Customs and Immigration Enforcement; Ronald D. Vitiello, Deputy Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement ; William P. Barr, Attorney General; Warden, Orange County; Correctional Center, Defendants
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

385 F.Supp.3d 349

Luis MARTINEZ, Petitioner,

v.Kevin K. MCALEENAN, Acting Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS); Thomas Decker, New York Field Office Director, US Customs and Immigration Enforcement; Ronald D. Vitiello, Deputy Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement ; William P. Barr, Attorney General; Warden, Orange County; Correctional Center, Defendants,

19-cv-2627 (NSR)

United States District Court, S.D. New York.

Signed June 14, 2019

Cheryl Renee David, Law Office of Cheryl David, Paul O'Dwyer, Law Office of Paul O'Dwyer, New York, NY, for Petitioner.

Michael James Byars, U.S. Attorney's Office, New York, NY, for Defendants.

ORDER & OPINION

NELSON S. ROMÁN, United States District Judge

Luis Martinez ("Petitioner"), a native and citizen of Mexico, has been living in the U.S. since 1990, when he was 12 or 13 years old. Petitioner has been detained in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement ("ICE") custody since January 16, 2019, allegedly pursuant to a reinstated order of removal. (See Petitioner's Letter dated 5/14/19, ECF No. 20.) Petitioner is detained in Essex County Correctional Facility, where he is in conditions identical to those of county jail inmates serving criminal sentences. (See Letter dated 6/12/19, ECF No. 36.) On March 24, 2019, Petitioner filed a writ of habeas corpus with this Court, arguing that he was never served with any reinstatement order when he was detained, and nor was his attorney, who for months repeatedly sought the alleged order justifying Mr. Martinez's detention. (ECF No. 1.)

Petitioner filed a First Amended Petition for his writ on April 21, 2019. (ECF No. 7.) Subsequently, on May 13, 2019, Petitioner filed an Order to Show Cause for his immediate release from custody on grounds that he and his counsel had still not received any notice or orders justifying his detention, and hence the detention was unconstitutional. (ECF No. 18.) On May 13, 2019, the day Petitioner filed his Order to Show Cause in this Court, ICE finally served him and his counsel with a Notice of Intent/ Decision to Reinstate the Prior Order (Form I-871). (See Letter, ECF No. 20.) Having finally received written notice, Petitioner did not receive a new bond hearing.

On May 28, 2019, I held a Show Cause Hearing to assess the legal basis and constitutionality of Petitioner's Detention. (See Docket Entry Dated 5/28/2019.) Following that hearing, I requested that the parties provide additional briefing regarding Petitioner's writ of habeas corpus in light of the fact that a belated Notice of Reinstatement Order had finally been served on Petitioner, four months after his initial ICE Detention. (See id. ) Both parties timely filed their briefs. Presently before the Court is Petitioner's Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus . (ECF No. 7.) For the following reasons, Petitioner's Writ is GRANTED.

BACKGROUND

The following facts are taken from the Petitioner's Petition for the Writ of habeas corpus and have largely not been disputed by the Government. While they are useful context, they are not the factual or legal basis, for the Court's ensuing decision.

Petitioner Luis Martinez is a citizen of Mexico who has been living in New Paltz, New York since 1990, when he was twelve years old. His father was murdered in Mexico when he was an infant, after which his mother came to the United States to work and support him and his siblings. Petitioner is married. His three children, mother, and two brothers are all U.S. citizens.

Along with his brother, Petitioner owns a well-known and successful construction company, which has projects throughout New Paltz and the Hudson Valley. The company provides work for hundreds of employees. Petitioner's other brother, Jesus Jose Martinez, was shot to death in New Paltz in 1999, while Petitioner was standing beside him, a murder that was never solved.

In September 2016, Petitioner filed an application with United States Citizenship and Immigrations Services ("USCIS") for a "U" visa, a form of legal status for victims of crimes. If approved, this will grant Petitioner legal residence in the United States, despite his prior immigration violations. Although this application is pending, Defendants apprehended Petitioner at his business in January 2019, detained him, threatened to deport him to Mexico, and claimed to be reinstating or have reinstated a prior removal order from more than 20 years ago. Yet, Petitioner claims, Defendants never provided him or his attorney with this supposedly reinstated order.

After being apprehended, Petitioner immediately applied for a stay of deportation based on the pending U visa, as he met the criteria for a stay. ICE denied the stay, but on grounds that are legally questionable for individuals with pending U visa petitions. Meanwhile, USCIS asked Petitioner to submit additional evidence in support of his U visa application.

In fear for his life after ICE denied his stay of removal and threatened to deport him, Petitioner asserted a claim for fear of persecution and torture in Mexico, a right afforded to people whom ICE claims are subject to reinstated orders of removal. This fear stemmed from threats against him relating to his father's murder, and his fear of retaliation based on information he had provided to the U.S. Government about a Mexican drug cartel. An asylum officer then interviewed Petitioner, found his fear credible, and yet denied the application for a stay. Afterwards, an immigration judge reversed the asylum officer's decision, thereby staying Petitioner's application.

Presently, if Petitioner's application for a U visa is approved, he will be eligible for "deferred action," a form of temporary legal immigration status, while he waits the additional years it typically takes for an actual visa to become available. If a U visa is granted, Petitioner will be eligible to apply for permanent residence (a green card) after about three more years. But if he is deported to Mexico before his U visa application is decided, Petitioner will not be eligible for "deferred action" and could spend several years in Mexico waiting for a U visa to become available. There is a legitimate risk of persecution if Petitioner is deported to Mexico, and there will be additional barriers to admissibility to the U.S. if he is deported—many of which he may not be able to overcome—even if his U visa is eventually approved.

That is Petitioner's immigration history and status. It provides useful context for his current predicament, though only collaterally relates to the instant issue, which is the constitutionality of his detention, and the Court's ability to release him through the writ of habeas corpus .

LEGAL STANDARDS

I. The Writ of Habeas Corpus Generally

"The writ of habeas corpus has played a great role in the history of human freedom" because "[i]t has been the judicial method of lifting undue restrains upon personal liberty." Price v. Johnston , 334 U.S. 266, 285, 68 S.Ct. 1049, 92 L.Ed. 1356 (1948). Its origins predate the U.S. Constitution, and can be traced back to the Magna Carta and even the Roman Empire. See Magna Carta, Art. 39 ("No free man is to be arrested, or imprisoned, or disseised, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any other way ruined, nor will we go against him or send against him, except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land."); see also Glass, Albert S, Historical Aspects of Habeas Corpus , St. John's Law Review: Vol. 9: No. 1, Article 3 (1934) (explaining that the writ of habeas corpus is similar to the Praetorian Interdict of the Roman Civil Law "de homine libero exhibendo ," through which if the praetor found that a freeman was restrained of his liberty contrary to good faith, he would order that man to be liberated). It is "at its core a remedy for unlawful executive detention." Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507, 536, 124 S.Ct. 2633, 159 L.Ed.2d 578 (2004). The typical remedy [for such detention] is of course, release." Munaf v. Geren , 553 U.S. 674, 128 S.Ct. 2207, 2221, 171 L.Ed.2d 1 (2008).

Due to its talismanic significance in protecting individual liberty from unlawful detention, habeas corpus is fundamentally governed by equity. Id. The Supreme Court has granted the writ when justice has so required. Carafas v. LaVallee , 391 U.S. 234, 88 S. Ct. 1556, 20 L.Ed.2d 554 (1968) (granting the writ even after inmate had completed incarceration and been released in order to prevent him from suffering collateral consequences of the petition being denied). And it has forgone its habeas release power when the nature of its relief would be inequitable and inappropriate. Munaf v. Geren , 553 U.S. 674, 128 S.Ct. 2207, 171 L.Ed.2d 1 (denying writ to shelter American citizens held captive in Iraq, where issuing writ would interfere with: Iraq's authority "to punish offenses against its laws committed within its borders" and U.S. Executive Branch's authority to handle sensitive military conduct on foreign territory during "ongoing hostilities") (citation omitted).

Again, the writ derives from broad equitable principles which, while aimed at securing release, provide courts with flexibility to use other forms of relief as justice requires. Carafas , 391 U.S. at 238-39, 88 S.Ct. 1556. ("the statute does not limit the relief that may be granted to discharge of the applicant from physical custody. Its mandate is broad with respect to relief that may be granted."); Munaf , 553 U.S. at 694, 128 S.Ct. 2207 (recognizing that writ was not invoked to seek classic "release" from detention by Multi-National Force- Iraq, but rather to procure an equitable "order requiring the United States to shelter them from the [Iraqi] government"); Bell v. Hood , 327 U.S. 678, 684, 66 S.Ct. 773, 90 L.Ed. 939 (1946) ("where federally protected rights [are threatened], it has been the position from the beginning that courts will be alert to adjust their remedies so as to grant the necessary relief").

II. Statutory Framework for District...