ACLU of Hawai‘i files lawsuit for release of Big Island resident detained for immigration status

The American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaiʻi filed a lawsuit in Hawai‘i District Court on Tuesday, petitioning for the release of a Hawai‘i Island resident who they say was unlawfully detained five months ago for his immigration status.

The nonprofit is seeking the release of Juan Jose Estrada Lopez, originally from Nicaragua, who was taken into custody in August during his green card interview. According to a press release from the ACLU on Wednesday, Lopez has been held at the Honolulu Federal Detention Center since that time.

A status conference has been set for March 10 at 9 a.m.

Lopez came to the U.S. from Nicaragua in 2022 and moved to Hawai‘i shortly after to work on a coffee farm, where he met and married his wife, who is a U.S. citizen. While there is no record of Lopez ever committing a crime or traffic infraction in the state, the ACLU indicated the federal government chose to detain him because he lacked proper documentation.

“Juan’s unexpected detention at our green card interview has turned our lives completely upside down,” said Lopez’s wife, Emily, in the press release. “What we thought was just a routine step in our immigration process has become the most difficult five months of our lives. Juan defines himself by his ability to provide, and losing that has been devastating. He’s suffering mentally, emotionally and physically, like any human being would.”

Lopez’s arrest comes on the heels of a new policy instituted in July by the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice that declares any noncitizen who entered the United States without inspection is categorically subject to mandatory detention and ineligible to seek release on bond.

“This policy upends decades of prior practice that had been consistent with due process,” the ACLU states.

The habeas immigration petition filed by the ACLU of Hawai‘i alleges that Lopez’s detention is unlawful because he is a member of the certified class and because the no-bond policy is unlawful.

Habeas corpus ensures that no person — citizen or not — can be held by the government without the right to challenge their detention before a judge. A habeas petition is a legal action that asks the court to release a person from unlawful detention.

In this lawsuit, Lopez seeks his immediate release from detention so that he can return to his wife on the Big Island and his community while continuing to pursue lawful immigration status in the United States.

“The executive branch is locking people up in violation of Congress’s laws and federal court orders,” said Leilani Stacy, ACLU-HI Immigrants’ Rights Attorney. “This has to stop. Filing this petition is our signal to the federal government, and local state actors, that the ACLU of Hawai‘i will ensure that the due process rights of all of our community members are protected —regardless of immigration status.”

The ACLU of Hawaiʻi has recently devoted additional resources to advance immigrants’ rights in Hawaiʻi, including by hiring its first-ever Immigrants’ Rights Attorney. This habeas petition is also the first lawsuit filed as part of this new initiative.

“We are making a deliberate commitment to strengthen our work defending immigrants and their families, and this case is the first step in that effort,” said Wookie Kim, ACLU-HI Legal Director. “No one in our islands should fear that engaging with the legal immigration process will result in indefinite detention without a hearing. We are in this fight for the long haul.”

In December, a California federal court ruled in a class action that the Trump administration’s policy that seeks to end bond eligibility for thousands of immigrants is unlawful and again declared that all members of the nationwide class are eligible for bond hearings.

Despite that court’s order, the federal government has refused to release people in the class — forcing individuals like Lopez to seek relief via habeas petitions.

Since last year, thousands of people have been jailed indefinitely with no opportunity for a bond hearing while their immigration cases proceed for months or years, according to the ACLU.

While more than 300 judges in hundreds of cases across the country have declared the government’s new detention policy to be contrary to immigration law and the U.S. Constitution, the vast majority of people have not been able to get bond hearings, the ACLU said.