Judge threatens government lawyer with fines after ICE violates court order
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A judge on Friday lifted a contempt finding on a government attorney after the Department of Homeland Security returned identification documents to a man nearly a week after releasing him from immigration detention.
On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Laura Provinzino found Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Isihara responsible for the noncompliance and threatened him with $500 in daily fines until DHS returned Rigoberto Soto Jimenez's belongings.
After DHS confirmed that it returned Soto Jimenez's belongings on Thursday, Provinzino issued a new order in which she writes that Isihara won't pay any fines.
Soto Jimenez’s detainment
According to court documents, Soto Jimenez is a citizen of Mexico and lives in Big Lake, Minn., with his children and spouse, who is a legal permanent U.S. resident.
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“Mr. Soto Jimenez has no criminal history or final order of removal,” writes attorney Erin Lins in a petition of habeas corpus seeking his release from immigration detention.
Lins writes that her client has lived in the United States for seven years and is “years into the process of obtaining lawful immigration status.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested Soto Jimenez Jan. 14 while he was at work, as part of the Trump Administration’s immigration enforcement operation targeting Minnesota.
Provinzino found that Soto Jimenez is not subject to mandatory detention under U.S. immigration law. In her release order, Provinzino noted that DHS failed to respond to Soto Jimenez’s petition by her Feb. 5 deadline.
Provinzino worked as a human rights attorney and in private practice in the early 2000s before serving as a federal prosecutor for 14 years. In 2024, President Joe Biden appointed her to the federal bench following the retirement of U.S. District Judge Wilhelmina Wright.
“[E]ach day that the Government does not respond is another day [Soto Jimenez] is being unlawfully detained,” Provinzino writes in her release order, which also required DHS to release Soto Jimenez in Minnesota by 5 p.m. on Feb. 13. The judge also ordered the department to return all of Soto Jimenez’s personal property, including his identification documents.
DHS freed Soto Jimenez ahead of the court-ordered deadline, but in Texas, not Minnesota, and without his Minnesota driver’s instruction permit and Mexican consular ID card.
“I personally dropped the ball.”
During a Wednesday hearing, Lins, Soto Jimenez’s attorney, told Provinzino that she had sent a message to the general email box at the El Paso ICE field office and attached the court order requiring Soto Jimenez to be released in Minnesota.
“I learned from my client that he had been released, which was timely, per the order, a day prior to the deadline, but he was released in El Paso,” Lins said, according to a transcript of the hearing.
Lins told the judge that she also emailed the Minnesota U.S. Attorney’s Office in an attempt to secure her client’s return to Minnesota and locate his belongings. Among the lawyers she contacted was Matthew Isihara, a U.S. Army attorney assigned to the office as a special assistant U.S. attorney following an exodus of senior staff.
“I waited a little bit to see if Mr. Isihara responded, given that he was looped in, and then followed up later that afternoon and received a reply that he would [and] had other pressing matters and would circle back,” Lins said.
Lins said that Soto Jimenez spent his first night of freedom in a shelter before making his way back to Minnesota, but nearly a week later DHS still had not returned her client’s belongings.
“And based on what I see in this exhibit, [of email exchanges between attorneys] there was no further circling back or communication from Mr. Isihara?” Provinzino asked.
“Not until this morning, your honor,” Lins replied.
“Here we have a complete breakdown,” Provinzino said later. “The government did nothing in this case, didn't even follow up by filing my order through [DHS’s Office of the Principal Legal Advisor].
I want to apologize for the situation,” Isihara said, according to the transcript.
“I've had anywhere between 126 and 129 [habeas corpus] cases assigned in the last month. It's been a very large volume, and it's sort of overwhelmed any, I think any individual attorney's ability to sort of keep up with,” Isihara added.
“My team and I have had to work around the clock, evenings and weekends as well, to keep up with these because these are really important cases,” Provinzino responded.
The judge continued: “Just on a human level, Mr. Isihara, do you believe that this is acceptable that the government has not in any way attempted to comply with the court's orders? But, more problematically, we have a situation where a petitioner was released in Texas when he should have been released in Minnesota, and he didn't have a place to stay that night, had to stay in a shelter and, through the good graces of an attorney, was able to secure a flight home the following day. Do you believe on a personal level that that is okay?”
“I would just say, on a personal level, I have immense sympathy for [Soto Jimenez’s] situation,” Isihara replied. “I concede that I personally dropped the ball in this case.”
“Why should I not hold you in contempt?” Provinzino asked.
“I think in this case, there wasn't any willful defiance of the court orders,” Isihara replied. “We are simply, as an office, under-resourced, and we are dealing with a situation that is largely the result of factors external to anybody in the U.S. Attorney's Office.”
“I have little confidence that petitioner's property will be returned to him absent some sanction,” Provinzino said at the conclusion of the Wednesday hearing before finding Isihara “primarily responsible for the ongoing noncompliance with the Court's February 9th order” and holding him in contempt of court.
The judge ordered Isihara to pay $500 a day in fines starting Thursday until the government returned Soto Jimenez’s property.
In a text message to MPR News late Wednesday, Minnesota U.S. Attorney Dan Rosen called the contempt order a "lawless abuse of judicial power."
In a filing after the hearing, DHS said it had located Soto Jimenez’s belongings and is sending the items to him in Minnesota.
