José Padilla, also known as Abdullah al-Muhajir or Muhajir Abdullah, is a United States citizen who was convicted in a federal court of aiding terrorists.
Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507 (2004), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court recognized the power of the U.S. government to detain enemy combatants, including U.S. citizens, but ruled that detainees who are U.S. citizens must have the rights of due process, and the ability to challenge their enemy combatant status before an impartial authority.
The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, Division C of Pub. L. 104–208 (text)(PDF), 110 Stat. 3009-546, enacted September 30, 1996, made major changes to the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). IIRIRA's changes became effective on April 1, 1997.
The Combatant Status Review Tribunals (CSRT) were a set of tribunals for confirming whether detainees held by the United States at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp had been correctly designated as "enemy combatants". The CSRTs were established July 7, 2004 by order of U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz after U.S. Supreme Court rulings in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld and Rasul v. Bush and were coordinated through the Office for the Administrative Review of the Detention of Enemy Combatants.
Moath Hamza Ahmed al-Alwi is a citizen of Yemen, held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camps, in Cuba. His detainee ID number is 28. Guantanamo analysts estimated he was born in 1977, in Bajor, Yemen.
Boumediene v. Bush, 553 U.S. 723 (2008), was a writ of habeas corpus submission made in a civilian court of the United States on behalf of Lakhdar Boumediene, a naturalized citizen of Bosnia and Herzegovina, held in military detention by the United States at the Guantanamo Bay detention camps in Cuba. Guantánamo Bay is not formally part of the United States, and under the terms of the 1903 lease between the United States and Cuba, Cuba retained ultimate sovereignty over the territory, while the United States exercises complete jurisdiction and control. The case was consolidated with habeas petition Al Odah v. United States. It challenged the legality of Boumediene's detention at the United States Naval Station military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba as well as the constitutionality of the Military Commissions Act of 2006. Oral arguments on the combined cases were heard by the Supreme Court on December 5, 2007.
Munaf v. Geren, 553 U.S. 674 (2008), is a United States Supreme Court case where the court unanimously concluded that the habeas corpus statute, 28 U.S.C. § 2241(c)(1), extends to U.S. citizens held overseas by American forces subject to an American chain of command, even if acting as part of a multinational coalition. But, it found that habeas corpus provided the petitioners with no relief, holding that "Habeas corpus does not require the United States to shelter such fugitives from the criminal justice system of the sovereign with authority to prosecute them."
Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009), was a United States Supreme Court case which held that plaintiffs must present a "plausible" cause of action. Alongside Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, Iqbal raised the threshold which plaintiffs needed to meet. Further, the Court held that government officials are not liable for the actions of their subordinates without evidence that they ordered the allegedly discriminatory activity. At issue was whether current and former federal officials, including FBI Director Robert Mueller and former United States Attorney General John Ashcroft, were entitled to qualified immunity against an allegation that they knew of or condoned racial and religious discrimination against Muslim men detained after the September 11 attacks. The decision also "transformed civil litigation in the federal courts" by making it much easier for courts to dismiss individuals' suits.
Indefinite detention is the incarceration of an arrested person by a national government or law enforcement agency for an indefinite amount of time without a trial; the practice violates many national and international laws, including human rights laws. In recent years, governments have indefinitely incarcerated individuals suspected of terrorism, often in black sites, sometimes declaring them enemy combatants.
Reno v. Flores, 507 U.S. 292 (1993), was a Supreme Court of the United States case that addressed the detention and release of unaccompanied minors.
Zadvydas v. Davis, 533 U.S. 678 (2001), was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States. The court ruled that the plenary power doctrine does not authorize the indefinite detention of immigrants under order of deportation whom no other country will accept. To justify detention of immigrants for a period longer than six months, the government was required to show removal in the foreseeable future or special circumstances.
Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348 (2015), was a United States Supreme Court case which analyzed whether police officers may extend the length of a traffic stop to conduct a search with a trained detection dog. In a 6–3 opinion, the Court held that officers may not extend the length of a traffic stop to conduct a dog sniff unrelated to the original purpose of the stop. However, the Court remanded the case to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit to determine whether the officer's extension of the traffic stop was independently justified by reasonable suspicion. Some analysts have suggested that the Court's decision to limit police authority was influenced by ongoing protests in Ferguson, Missouri.
In United States immigration enforcement, "catch and release" refers to a practice of releasing a migrant to the community while he or she awaits hearings in immigration court, as an alternative to holding them in immigration detention. The migrants whom U.S. immigration enforcement agencies have allowed to remain in the community pending immigrant hearings have been those deemed low risk, such as children, families, and those seeking asylum.
The 2017 term of the Supreme Court of the United States began October 2, 2017, and concluded September 30, 2018. The table below illustrates which opinion was filed by each justice in each case and which justices joined each opinion.
Nielsen v. Preap, No. 16-1363, 586 U.S. ___ (2019), was a United States Supreme Court case related to the detention of legal immigrants with criminal histories. In a 5–4 vote, the Court ruled that the government has the power to detain immigrants at any time that have committed certain crimes that could lead to their deportation, even if those crimes occurred long in the past.
Department of Homeland Security v. Thuraissigiam, 591 U.S. ___ (2020), was a United States Supreme Court case involving whether the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, which limits habeas corpus judicial review of the decisions of immigration officers, violates the Suspension Clause of Article One of the U.S. Constitution. In the 7–2 opinion, the Court ruled that the law does not violate the Suspension Clause.
Ahilan Arulanantham is an American human rights lawyer. He specializes in immigrants' rights, particularly the rights of people facing deportation from the United States. He has been Senior Counsel and Director of Advocacy/Legal Director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, and has also been a lecturer at the University of Chicago and University of California, Irvine law schools. Arulanantham is the recipient of a 2016 MacArthur Fellow.
Shaughnessy v. United States ex rel Mezei, 345 U.S. 206 (1953), was a United States Supreme Court case that established the federal government's power to detain migrants at the border pending deportation. The Supreme Court, in a five to four decision, held that the Attorney General's continued exclusion of the unauthorized immigrant without a hearing does not amount to an unlawful detention, and the court may not temporarily admit such individuals into the United States pending arrangements for their departure abroad. Some consider the decision in Shaughnessy v. United States ex rel Mezei as the Court's strongest statement of the plenary power doctrine as the power to permanently exclude noncitizens is based in U.S. sovereignty and largely immune from judicial control.
Garland v. Gonzalez, 596 U.S. ___ (2022), was a United States Supreme Court case related to immigration detention.
Johnson v. Arteaga-Martinez, 596 U.S. ___ (2022), was a United States Supreme Court case related to immigration detention.
