U.S. District Court Judge Fred Biery issued a sharp rebuke of the Trump administration’s immigration policies while ordering the release of 5‑year‑old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, from immigration custody.
Liam was taken from a running car in his driveway on Jan. 20 by ICE agents as he returned home from preschool. The Department of Homeland Security said his father — the person immigration officers were seeking — had “abandoned the boy.”
School officials said agents used the child “as bait” to try to get the family to open the door of their home, and refused to leave the boy with another adult while pursuing his father.
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Ramos and his father, who entered the U.S. legally to apply for asylum, were taken to an ICE holding facility in Dilley, Texas. A judge has prohibited ICE from deporting them.
Liam’s mother said her son appears to be sick from the food at the facility.
"The case has its genesis in the ill-conceived and incompetently implemented government pursuit of daily deportation quotas, apparently even if it requires traumatizing children," said Biery, who was appointed to the federal bench by President Bill Clinton.
"Civics lesson to the government: Administrative warrants issued by the executive branch to itself do not pass probable cause muster. That is called the fox guarding the henhouse. The Constitution requires an independent judicial officer," he added. "Observing human behavior confirms that for some among us, the perfidious lust for unbridled power and the imposition of cruelty in its quest know no bounds and are bereft of human decency. And the rule of law be damned."
Federal authorities tried to claim that Conejo Arias endangered the child.
"I do a little bit more follow-up research, and what I find is that the 5-year-old was not arrested, that his dad was an illegal alien, and when they went to arrest his illegal alien father, the father ran," Vice President JD Vance said. "Are they supposed to let a 5-year-old child freeze to death?"
