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Judge orders DHS to return gay asylum-seeker.
“The Court finds that the public benefits from living in a country where rules are followed and where promises are kept,” Judge Brian E. Murphy wrote.
A federal judge in Massachusetts has ordered the U.S. government to return a gay Guatemalan asylum-seeker who was wrongfully deported under a new Trump policy, sharply criticizing immigration officials for misleading the court and flouting due process.
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In a ruling issued late Friday, U.S. District Judge Brian E. Murphy granted a preliminary injunction in D.V.D. v. DHS, siding with a plaintiff known as O.C.G., who had been granted protection from deportation after testifying about the brutal violence he endured as a gay man in Guatemala. Just two days later, and without warning, Trump administration officials put him on a bus to Mexico—a country where he had previously been kidnapped and raped—and ultimately sent back to Guatemala, where he remains in hiding.
Related: Jon Lovett and Tim Miller team up to ‘raise hell’ over gay asylum-seeker vanished to El Salvador by Trump
“This case presents... the banal horror of a man being wrongfully loaded onto a bus and sent back to a country where he was allegedly just raped and kidnapped,” Murphy wrote.
The judge called the Department of Homeland Security’s conduct deeply troubling, noting that the government twice gave the court false information—under oath—and later admitted it had no witness to support its claims that O.C.G. had consented to his removal. “The only evidence before the Court, therefore, is O.C.G.’s uncontroverted assertion that he was given no notice of his transfer to Mexico and no opportunity to explain why it would be dangerous to send him there,” Murphy wrote.
“It must be said that, while mistakes obviously happen, the events leading up to this decision are troubling,” the judge added. He noted that DHS not only submitted inaccurate sworn declarations but also exacerbated the harm by publishing O.C.G.’s full name on the public docket in violation of court orders.
Related: Kristi Noem won’t say if gay asylum-seeker deported to El Salvador’s ‘hellhole’ prison is still alive
Murphy found that O.C.G. is likely to succeed in proving his constitutional rights were violated and that the public interest weighs decisively in favor of his return. “The Court finds that the public benefits from living in a country where rules are followed and where promises are kept,” Murphy wrote. “Rules are tedious and frustrating, but they also keep us fair and honest.”
In ordering O.C.G.’s return, the court noted the deportation occurred despite a judge’s ruling barring his removal to Guatemala and assurances in immigration court that he would not be sent to Mexico. DHS officers ignored O.C.G.’s pleas to contact his attorney and denied him any opportunity to object. The judge dismissed government arguments minimizing the harm, saying the man faces not only the risk of death but the loss “of all that makes life worth living.”
The ruling follows The Advocate’s earlier reporting on O.C.G.’s sworn declaration, in which he said he lives in fear and isolation. “I wear hats and try to camouflage myself so that no one recognizes me and sees that I have returned,” he wrote. “Living a normal life is impossible here.”
Related: Gay Guatemalan asylum-seeker deported by Trump by mistake pleads for lifeline in federal court
The case is part of a broader class-action suit challenging the Trump administration’s third-country deportation scheme, which fast-tracked asylum-seekers to nations they had never lived in and where they lacked protection. Plaintiffs allege the Department of Homeland Security has adopted an unlawful policy of deporting people with final removal orders to countries never designated in their immigration proceedings, without giving them advance notice or the opportunity to raise a claim that they fear persecution or torture. The complaint challenges DHS’s lack of any written safeguards and targets a February directive that instructed immigration officers to re-detain individuals previously granted relief and reevaluate them for third-country deportation, often after years of stable compliance.
O.C.G.’s case echoes those of Maryland father Kilmar Abrego Garcia and gay Venezuelan makeup artist Andry Hernández Romero—both deported to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison under similar circumstances. While Maryland Democratic U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen was able to visit Garcia, Romero hasn’t been heard from since he disappeared in March.
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem has refused to confirm whether Hernández Romero is still alive.
Murphy’s order requires DHS to coordinate with O.C.G.’s attorneys and take “all immediate steps” to bring him back to the U.S. within days. The court waived any bond requirement and rejected arguments that returning him would pose a burden.
