Minnesota refugee challenges U.S. for release from ICE custody

A Minnesota refugee who was arrested last month by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents is petitioning his release from custody on the grounds he’s been jailed longer than federal law allows.

Tou Pao Lee, 43, was among the dozens of Hmong Minnesotans arrested in early June by federal immigration officers who claimed many of them have prior sex offenses, including Lee. Lee was ordered to be removed from the United States in 2005 by an immigration judge not long after pleading guilty to solicitation of a minor to practice prostitution. Lee remained in ICE custody from February-June 2005 during the immigration hearings, then placed on supervision.

Since his release from immigration custody two decades ago, Lee’s deportation has been delayed as federal officials tried to secure a necessary travel document from Laos, his family’s home country. The government holdup is the impetus for Lee’s petition, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota.

Lee’s attorneys wrote that his second booking into ICE custody violates federal regulations, pointing to a Supreme Court opinion that affirmed undocumented immigrants cannot be detained indefinitely and established a six-month cap to hold people under the presumption they will be deported in the near future. Lee’s jailing, the court filing said, has exceeded that term.

“In the intervening twenty years, ICE has been unable to secure a travel document, and during over 6 months in ICE detention, ICE appears to remain unable to secure such a document. … There has been no indication from the Government of Laos that a travel document will issue for (Lee) nor that the decision on its issuance is anticipated in the near future,” the petition asserts, calling the possibility of Lee’s removal “significantly” unlikely in the foreseeable future.

Patrick McKeon, Lee’s attorney from the Massachusetts-based law office of Louis Haskell, argued in the writ that Lee has been fully cooperative with ICE in the 20 years since his deportation order, and it’s unclear what spurred his second arrest.

“At present there does not appear to be any change in circumstances that would warrant a second detention, especially when (Lee) has willingly complied with all of ICE’s demands,” the filing said.

Lee’s arrest occurred as President Donald Trump’s administration has pledged to carry out ramped up efforts to crack down on immigration enforcement. Two dozen Hmong men living in Minnesota were taken into custody about the time of his arrest.

In arguing for his release, Lee’s attorney said he is not a flight risk nor a danger, emphasizing he’s carried a full-time job and has been an active member of the community since his “single transgression.”

Lee, born in a refugee camp in Thailand, came to the United States in 1991 at 10 years old. His family fled Laos following the Laotian Civil War, also known as the Secret War, the suit said. He’s been with his wife for 24 years and raised six children. The couple recently became grandparents.