An Egyptian family that had just secured release from more than 10 months in immigration detention has been taken back into custody by federal authorities, according to their lawyers.
The development comes only days after a court ruling ordered their freedom.
Hayam El Gamal and her five children, aged between five and 18, were detained again less than 48 hours after a federal judge directed their release, their legal representatives confirmed in a statement.
The Colorado-based family was rearrested while fulfilling a scheduled check-in requirement at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Denver, as reported by The Colorado Sun.
According to their legal team, ICE had placed the family on a flight bound for Michigan, with plans for onward removal from the United States to an undisclosed destination.
However, Eric Lee, one of the family’s attorneys, later revealed that a federal court approved an emergency motion halting the deportation.
In response, the Department of Homeland Security stated on Saturday that the family was being afforded “full due process,” while also criticising the judge responsible for ordering their release, describing him as an “activist judge” who is “releasing this terrorist’s family onto American streets AGAIN.”
“We are confident the courts will ultimately vindicate us,” the DHS’s acting assistant secretary, Lauren Bis, said.
The agency did not clarify the reason for detaining the family again following Thursday’s court ruling.
El Gamal and her children had initially been released on Thursday after US District Judge Fred Biery ordered their freedom, in line with a similar decision issued earlier in the week.
The family’s legal troubles began in June last year when they were first taken into federal custody. Their detention became the longest recorded for a family during President Donald Trump’s administration. It followed charges filed against El Gamal’s former husband, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, who was accused of attempted murder, assault, and committing a federal hate crime linked to a firebombing incident in Boulder, Colorado.
Authorities had previously indicated they were examining the extent of the family’s knowledge of the attack. El Gamal, who divorced Soliman after his arrest, has strongly denounced the incident and maintained that neither she nor her children were aware of any such plans.
While Trump has defended his strict immigration policies as necessary to combat illegal immigration and crime, critics and human rights organisations argue that such measures undermine due process and freedom of expression.
