Doe v. Barr

Background

John Doe sought a temporary restraining order requiring his release from immigration detention at the Yuba County Jail. He entered the United States from El Salvador in 2014 seeking asylum after violence and threats by members of the 18th Street gang. The opinion states that he later received convictions for two public-intoxication offenses, domestic violence, and violating a protective order. He received a cumulative time-served sentence of 65 days and was then transferred to immigration custody, where he remained detained.

The opinion states that immigration authorities moved Doe among three detention facilities six times over roughly four years while his asylum case moved among immigration judges and the Board of Immigration Appeals. The Board remanded his case three times because of legal errors by immigration judges. At Yuba County Jail, Doe was confined to his cell for nearly 19 hours each day, and he sometimes lacked toilet paper and could not afford basic hygiene supplies.

Doe had been diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorder, major depressive disorder with psychotic features, and severe anxiety. The opinion describes hallucinations, panic attacks, insomnia, mood swings, chronic suicidality, and at least three suicide attempts between 2017 and 2020. Medical professionals stated that he required intensive treatment, that his condition placed him at high risk of further suicide attempts, and that his mental-health conditions and history of alcohol dependency made him particularly vulnerable to COVID-19 complications. Doe’s counsel had arranged for inpatient treatment at the Psychiatric Emergency Department of San Francisco General Hospital if he were released.

Legal standard

The court applied the standard for a preliminary injunction, which is the same standard used for a temporary restraining order. The requesting party ordinarily must show a strong likelihood of success on the merits, likely irreparable harm without relief, a balance of hardships favoring relief, and consistency with the public interest. Because Doe sought a mandatory injunction—an order requiring the government to take the affirmative step of releasing him—the court required the law and facts to clearly favor his position.

Jurisdiction and standing

The respondents argued that the court lacked jurisdiction because Doe’s immediate custodian, the Yuba County Sheriff, was not named. The court rejected that argument. It reasoned that the county jail was providing detention services for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and that ICE controlled Doe’s admission and release. The court found that David Jennings, the San Francisco Field Office Director for ICE, was within the district and had discretionary authority to release Doe. It therefore concluded that the immediate-custodian rule did not apply and that at least one named respondent could provide the requested relief.

The respondents also argued that Doe lacked standing because he was not infected with COVID-19 and his risk of infection was speculative. The court disagreed. It relied on the rapid spread of COVID-19, the possibility of rapid transmission in confined settings, evidence that Doe was immunocompromised, his need for intensive psychiatric care, and information that another prisoner in his pod might have COVID-19 symptoms. The court found that Doe had standing and did not need to become infected before seeking relief.

Merits and other injunction factors

The court treated Doe’s challenge to his detention conditions as a Fifth Amendment due-process claim. For a civil detainee, the relevant question was whether the conditions amounted to punishment. Conditions may be punitive if they are expressly intended to punish or are excessive in relation to a legitimate alternative purpose.

The court accepted that the government’s stated purposes—ensuring Doe’s presence at immigration proceedings and allowing execution of any final removal order—were nonpunitive. But it found that Doe had clearly shown a likelihood of success in proving that his detention at Yuba County Jail was excessive in relation to those purposes. The court emphasized his high risk of severe illness or death from COVID-19 and his inability to practice meaningful social distancing in the jail. It also found likely irreparable harm, concluding that Doe could not meaningfully follow public-health guidance on distancing, protective equipment, and handwashing while detained there.

The court found that the balance of hardships favored Doe and that the public interest favored granting relief because doing so could help protect public health and limit COVID-19’s spread in detention facilities and surrounding communities.

Disposition

The court conditionally granted Doe’s motion for a temporary restraining order, pending preparation of a later release order containing reasonable conditions. The court required proposed addresses where Doe would shelter in place, transportation from the jail, restrictions on leaving those addresses except for specified purposes, and compliance with federal, state, and local laws. It also ordered the parties’ counsel to meet and confer and submit proposed additional release conditions by April 29, 2020. The opinion did not itself order release without those conditions or state that the later release order had already been issued.