Thongvilay v. Field Office Director, San Francisco Field Office
- Sallie Kim
- 3:23-cv-05724
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 2
In Thongvilay v. Field Office Director, Magistrate Judge Kim transferred the detention petition to the Eastern District of California because Thongvilay was detained there.
Pamot Thongvilay, who was detained at the Mesa Verde Detention Center, and the parties to his detention challenge in the Northern District of California.
What happened
Thongvilay v. Field Office Director concerns Pamot Thongvilay’s petition asking a court to review his prolonged immigration detention under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. Thongvilay, who filed without a lawyer, said he was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the Mesa Verde Detention Center in Bakersfield, California.
The court explained that a petition challenging a person’s current physical confinement generally must be filed in the federal district where the person is held. The detention center is in Kern County, which lies in the Eastern District of California, not the Northern District of California.
Magistrate Judge Kim transferred the petition to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California and directed the clerk to transfer the matter immediately. The order did not decide whether Thongvilay’s detention was lawful.
The detailed version
- Thongvilay v. Field Office Director, San Francisco Field Office · No. 3:23-cv-05724
- Sallie Kim
- Nov. 9, 2023
Background
Pamot Thongvilay, identified in the caption as A025057918 and described as a citizen of Laos, filed a petition without a lawyer under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. The petition challenged his prolonged detention by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the Mesa Verde Detention Center in Bakersfield, California.
Jurisdiction and venue
The court applied the federal habeas statute’s rule that a district court may grant a writ only within its jurisdiction. For a petition challenging present physical confinement, the court explained that jurisdiction generally lies only in the federal district where the person is confined. The court described this as a bright-line district-of-confinement rule and stated that the statutory exceptions in 28 U.S.C. §§ 2241(d) and 2255 did not apply.
The court also relied on Ninth Circuit precedent holding that this rule applies to challenges to immigration detention. Thongvilay was detained at the Mesa Verde Detention Center in Bakersfield, in Kern County. Because Kern County lies within the Eastern District of California, the court concluded that jurisdiction and venue for this detention challenge lay only in that district.
Disposition
The court TRANSFERRED the petition to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California and directed the clerk to transfer the matter forthwith. The order did not reach the merits of Thongvilay’s challenge to his detention.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.