Judge orders 5-year-old used as ‘bait’ by ICE to be freed from detention
Geoff Mulvihill
A five-year-old boy and his father must be released by Tuesday from central Texas, where they are being held after being detained by immigration officials in Minnesota last month, a federal judge ruled in a ruling that harshly criticized the Trump administration’s enforcement approach.
Images of Liam Conejo Ramos, wearing a bunny hat and Spider-Man backpack, surrounded by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in the Minneapolis suburb of Columbia Heights on Jan. 20 sparked further outcry over the administration’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota.
This also led to a protest at a Texas family detention center and a visit from two Democratic members of Congress.
District Judge Fred Biery, appointed by former Democratic president Bill Clinton, said in his decision that “the case has its origins in the government’s pursuit of daily deportation quotas, even when this apparently involved traumatizing children.”
Biery had previously ruled that the boy and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, could not be removed from the United States, at least for now.
Neighbors and school officials say federal immigration agents in Minnesota used the kindergartener as “bait” by telling him to knock on his mother’s door to get her mother to answer.
The Department of Homeland Security called this description of events a “disgusting lie.” The father reportedly fled on foot and left his son in a running vehicle in the driveway.
The government says Arias entered the United States illegally in December 2024. The family’s lawyer says Arias has a pending asylum request that allows him to remain in the country.
In his ruling, Biery included a photo of Liam Conejo Ramos and cited two lines from the Bible: “Jesus said, ‘Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to these belong the kingdom of heaven,'” and “Jesus wept.”
He’s not the only federal judge to come down hard on ICE lately. A Minnesota-based judge with a conservative background has repeatedly accused the agency of violating court orders.
Stephen Miller, the White House’s chief of staff for policy, said there was a goal of 3,000 immigration detentions a day; The judge described this figure as a “quota”.
Spokespeople for the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
During a visit last week by Texas congressmen Joaquin Castro and Jasmine Crockett, five-year-old Liam slept in the arms of his father, who said his son was often tired and wasn’t eating well at the detention facility, which houses about 1,100 people, according to Castro.
Detainee families have reported poor conditions at the detention center since it reopened last year, including maggots in food, fights over clean water and inadequate medical care. An ICE report released in December acknowledged that 400 children were detained for longer than the recommended 20 days.
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