Decisions

E.D. Cal. March 26, 2026 833 F. Supp. 3d 1092; 2026 WL 849861. Findings and recommendations 10 March 2026, order adopting them 26 March 2026. Third country: None identified. The injunction is prospective.

A man ordered removed to Vietnam in 1998, released by a federal court in 2000 because there was no reasonable likelihood of removal, and living under an order of supervision since then, was taken into immigration custody in July 2025 on the day he was due to be paroled from a state sentence. He filed a habeas petition himself, without a lawyer, after his request for appointed counsel was refused. He won on every ground he raised. The magistrate judge recommended, and the district judge adopted, an order releasing him immediately on his previous conditions, requiring the government to hand back his identification, passport, work permit and social security card at release, and permanently barring the government from revoking his supervision again without following 8 C.F.R. 241.13(i) and due process. The order also set out, in numbers, what the government must do before it may remove him to any third country: a meaningful opportunity and at least ten days to raise a fear-based claim; if he shows a reasonable fear, the government must move to reopen his removal proceedings; and if he does not, a meaningful opportunity and at least fifteen days to seek reopening himself. On the punitive question the court found that, to the extent the policy deliberately seeks to remove people to countries where they will be imprisoned on arrival, it is punitive and violates due process, following Baltodano v. Bondi. It reached that finding on the petitioner's uncontested allegations, and explained why they were uncontested: the government did not address them, and under Rule 8(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure an allegation that is not denied is admitted. The same silence appears in Nguyen v. Scott, Abubaka v. Bondi and Baltodano v. Bondi, where courts recorded that the government argued only that the question was foreclosed and never answered it on the merits. The findings also record the state of D.V.D. v. Department of Homeland Security as at 10 March 2026: the District of Massachusetts had set the third-country removal policy aside as unlawful on 25 February 2026 and held that class members have a right to meaningful notice before removal to any third country and a meaningful opportunity to raise a country-specific claim against it; that judgment was stayed until 12 March 2026 or until the First Circuit ruled on a stay motion; and an appeal was pending.

Prolonged detention (Zadvydas) Revocation of supervision Third-country removal Notice Reopened removal proceedings Unconstitutional punishment Wong Wing Rule 8(b)(6) admission Self-represented petitioner D.V.D. class action

Caution The punitive finding rests on allegations the government never answered, treated as admitted under Rule 8(b)(6). That is a rule of pleading, not a finding on evidence, and the decision says so. It is a description of what happens when the government declines to contest a claim, and it would carry less weight against a government that had. This is a district court decision and binds only the parties. The petitioner had serious convictions, including a sentence of twenty-five years to life, and still obtained the injunction, because the protection does not depend on the record of the person invoking it. The account of D.V.D. above is the state of that case as the court recorded it on 10 March 2026, not as at today. Anyone relying on it should check where the appeal now stands.