Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier has reportedly directed authorities in the Sunshine State to stop immigration arrests from being carried out under a new law, which was signed into effect by Gov. Ron DeSantis in February, after a federal judge ripped local cops in court for ignoring an order she gave blocking such arrests.

“There is no such basis,” proclaimed U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams, a Barack Obama appointee, in court on Friday, according to the Miami Herald. “Why aren’t these people being released immediately?” she reportedly asked.

Robert Schenck, a lawyer who is representing the Office of the Attorney General, which is being sued over the new state law that was signed into effect by DeSantis — allowing for the arrest and prosecution of undocumented immigrants in Florida — claimed during the hearing that while state officials were blocked from issuing arrest warrants under Williams’ order, the state believed that law enforcement officers did not have to comply because they don’t act “in concert” with one another, per the Herald.

1. Home
2. Daily News
3. DOJ opposes court-ordered return of immigrant,…

Attorney General

DOJ opposes court-ordered return of immigrant, suspends lawyer who said he shouldn’t have been deported

By Debra Cassens Weiss

April 7, 2025, 2:23 pm CDT

Updated: The U.S. Department of Justice on Monday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay a federal judge’s order to return an immigrant mistakenly sent to a prison in El Salvador in Central America—a move that followed the department’s decision to place one of its lawyers on indefinite leave, apparently for his admissions in the case.

The government is asking the high court to issue an administrative stay to block the order by U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis of the District of Maryland and to vacate her injunction.

The Washington Post and the New York Times have coverage of the government’s April 7 filing, while the New York Times, CNN and NBC News are among the publications with coverage of the DOJ lawyer’s suspension. Additional stories are noted by How Appealing.

The government application claims that Xinis “ordered unprecedented relief: dictating to the United States that it must not only negotiate with a foreign country to return an enemy alien on foreign soil but also succeed by 11:59 p.m. tonight.”

“While the United States concedes that removal to El Salvador was an administrative error,” the application says, “that does not license district courts to seize control over foreign relations, treat the executive branch as a subordinate diplomat, and demand that the United States let a member of a foreign terrorist organization into America tonight.”

Chief Justice John Roberts temporarily paused Xinis’ deadline Monday afternoon to allow for a full review by the Supreme Court, the Washington Post reports.

Xinis is an appointee of former President Barack Obama.

The government had alleged that the mistakenly deported immigrant, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, is a member of MS-13, a gang designated a foreign terrorist organization by the United States. Xinis said the government had offered no evidence to show that he is a gang member.

The now-suspended DOJ lawyer, Erez Reuveni, was the acting deputy director of the department’s Office of Immigration Litigation. He had conceded in court that Abrego Garcia should not have been sent to El Salvador, and he had no evidence showing why the immigrant was even arrested, according to NBC News.

“The absence of evidence speaks for itself,” he said. “The government made a choice here to produce no evidence.”

When Xinis asked what kind of practical impediment kept the government from securing Abrego Garcia’s return, Reuveni said he asked the same question when the case was assigned to him.

“I have not yet received an answer that I find satisfactory,” he said.

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi told the New York Times in a statement that Reuveni did not follow her order.

“At my direction, every Department of Justice attorney is required to zealously advocate on behalf of the United States,” Bondi said. “Any attorney who fails to abide by this direction will face consequences.”

The case is Noem v. Abrego Garcia.

Updated April 7 at 3:25 p.m. to include reporting on Chief Justice John Roberts’ order.

Write a letter to the editor, share a story tip or update, or report an error.

1. Home
2. Daily News
3. Judge gave ‘reasonable impression’ she was…

Judiciary

Judge gave ‘reasonable impression’ she was letting immigrant evade ICE, ethics charges say

By Debra Cassens Weiss

December 5, 2024, 12:52 pm CST

A Massachusetts judge who allegedly gave a “reasonable impression” that she was allowing an immigrant to evade federal custody was “less than fully candid” when asked about the incident, according to an ethics complaint filed Monday.

The judge, Judge Shelley M. Richmond Joseph of Massachusetts, is accused of willful misconduct in the ethics complaint.

Boston.com, Reuters, the Daily Mail and Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly have coverage.

Joseph maintains, however, that she was not aware of a plan to let Jose Medina-Perez escape custody, and she was cooperative and truthful in the investigation by supervisors and disciplinary authorities. She “committed no misconduct and certainly no willful judicial misconduct,” her lawyers said in the written response to the charges.

“Judge Joseph looks forward to a hearing where all the circumstances finally become public,” said Thomas Hoopes, her lawyer, in a statement published by Reuters.

Joseph had once faced federal charges of conspiracy to obstruct justice over the April 2018 incident in the Newton, Massachusetts, courthouse.

Prosecutors had alleged that Joseph allowed Medina-Perez to go downstairs to the lockup, supposedly to retrieve property. The immigrant was then allowed to leave through a back door by a court officer. The charges were dropped in September 2022 after Joseph agreed to report herself to the Massachusetts Commission on Judicial Conduct.

The ethics complaint recounted the alleged sequence of events.

Medina-Perez was in court on a Pennsylvania warrant and two controlled-substance violations. A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent was in the courtroom, and Joseph asked him to wait outside in accord with district court policy. At some point before a reconvened hearing, the defense attorney “formulated a plan with the court officer” to avoid ICE agents in which Medina-Perez would be returned to the lockup and let out of a door by the court officer.

The prosecutor later advised Joseph and the defense attorney that she no longer thought that Medina-Perez was the subject of the Pennsylvania warrant, and she would not seek bail on the misdemeanor charges. During a recorded sidebar conference, the defense lawyer said, “ICE is going to pick him up if he walks out the front door. But I think the best thing for us to do is to clear the fugitive issue, release him on a personal, … and hope that we can avoid ICE.”

Joseph allegedy replied, “The other alternative is if you need more time to figure this out—hold until tomorrow.” The defense lawyer responded that ICE would pick up Medina-Perez if he was bailed out. Joseph allegedly responded, “ICE is gonna get him?” and, “What if we detain him?”

The defense lawyer then asked whether the sidebar conference was on the record. Joseph directed the court clerk to turn off the recording equipment. The unrecorded remarks lasted 52 seconds.

Joseph’s recorded statements “would give a reasonable observer the impression that she sought to assist defense counsel in identifying a means for the defendant to avoid ICE,” the ethics complaint says. “Judge Joseph’s willingness to conduct an unrecorded sidebar conversation with counsel, in violation of [a district court rule], added to the basis for that impression.”

The defense lawyer allegedly asked Joseph in the unrecorded conference to allow him to accompany Medina-Perez to return to the lockup area after he was released from state custody. The defense lawyer also allegedly said Medina-Perez could be released through a rear door, according to the ethics complaint. Joseph allegedly agreed to the request with the knowledge that ICE agents were waiting in a different area of the courthouse.

When the recorder was turned back on, the defense lawyer said he thought that the defendant had property downstairs, and he would like to speak with him with an interpreter. “That’s fine. Of course,” Joseph said. After their arrival downstairs, the court officer released the defendant from the rear door, unbeknownst to the ICE agent.

Joseph failed to disclose the unrecorded session to the first justice of the Newton District Court, and when asked about it by a regional administrative judge, she said her unfamiliarity with courtroom equipment may have caused a portion of the hearing not to be recorded, the ethics complaint said.

She mentioned an experience in another courtroom in which she disconnected the recording system after learning that it was amplifying a sidebar conversation. In a conversation with the chief justice of the district court, she denied having anything to do with the defendant’s release.

In her response, Joseph denied that the defense lawyer told her of a plan to release the defendant through the rear door. In addition, she had no knowledge where the ICE agents were waiting outside the courtroom, the response said.

In her response, Joseph said she suggested detaining Medina-Perez to give the defense lawyer time to investigate his belief that ICE had issued a detainer for the wrong person. Because prosecutors were not seeking bail, she thought that the defendant would be released to ICE after his lawyer spoke with him, she said.

As for the unrecorded sidebar, her experiences as a practicing lawyer “led her to believe that this was an occurrence with no sinister meaning,” her response said.

Joseph was suspended in April 2019 as a result of the federal indictment but was reinstated after the federal charges were dropped in 2022, according to Boston.com. She is currently a judge for the Boston Municipal Court.