In a recent and controversial decision, a federal judge in Texas ordered the immediate release of a five-year-old boy and his father who were being held in an immigration detention center. The case began in Minnesota, where U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested Adrian Conejo Arias and his son, Liam. Following their arrest, the pair was transported to a family residential center in Dilley, Texas, a facility used specifically for detaining parents with children.
The circumstances surrounding the arrest are a subject of intense debate. According to reports from school officials and the boy’s mother, ICE agents allegedly used the five-year-old as “bait.” They claimed that while the father was being detained, agents took the child to the front door of the family home and had him knock, hoping to lure other family members out. The mother stated she watched from inside but was too terrified to open the door, fearing she would also be arrested and leave her other children with no one to care for them.
ICE officials, however, provided a very different version of events. They claimed that when agents approached the father, he attempted to flee on foot, abandoning his young son in a running vehicle during the freezing Minnesota winter. The agency maintained that its officers stepped in to care for the child, even taking him to get food, and tried to return him to his family at the home, but those inside refused to answer the door.
The legal battle moved to a Texas courtroom under Judge Samuel Frederick Biery, Jr. In a brief three-page ruling, the judge ordered ICE to release both the father and the son. What makes the order unusual is not just the result, but the way it was written. Rather than providing a standard legal analysis of immigration law or the specific facts of the arrest, the judge filled the opinion with personal critiques and historical references. He quoted the Declaration of Independence and the New Testament, and he compared ICE’s use of administrative warrants to “the fox guarding the henhouse.”
The judge’s primary criticism centered on the validity of these administrative warrants—documents issued by the executive branch rather than a neutral judge. He argued that the Constitution requires an independent judicial officer to oversee such arrests. This perspective is controversial because federal law has long allowed ICE to use these warrants, and previous courts have upheld them. If this judge’s view were applied broadly, it could fundamentally change how immigration authorities are required to process arrests.
Critics of the ruling point out that the judge seemed to rely more on emotion and political frustration than on established law. While many agree that detaining children is a sensitive and often heartbreaking issue, legal experts noted that the judge failed to address the government’s concern that the father might be a flight risk, especially given the allegations that he fled during the initial encounter.
Ultimately, the boy and his father were ordered to be released by early February. The case highlights the deep divisions in America over immigration enforcement, the role of the judiciary in political matters, and the ongoing debate over how the government should handle families caught in the middle of the immigration system.
