The Legal Aid Society brought an emergency action during the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic to challenge the continued civil detention of five medically vulnerable immigrants at Hudson County or Bergen County jails at heightened risk of severe illness or death if they were to contract the virus. The suit argued that the government’s continued detention of our clients amounted to deliberate indifference to their medical needs, in violation of the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment and was part of Legal Aid’s rapid response to support medically-vulnerable individuals in custody during the pandemic. In her decision ordering the immediate release of our clients, Judge Madeline Cox Arleo of the U.S. District Court of New Jersey, said:

“By failing to implement the CDC’s instructions for the most vulnerable individuals, and by detaining those persons in a jail setting during a rapidly accelerating COVID-19 pandemic without providing them with adequate means to follow hygiene and other health protocols, Respondents have placed Petitioners at a substantially enhanced risk for severe illness or death. There can be no greater punishment. Accordingly, the Court is satisfied Petitioners have demonstrated that Respondents’ conduct amounts to punishment under the Due Process Clause.”