In Under 500 Words, a Judge Weaponized Wit to Free the Child Detained by ICE

[LearnedHand]

(NYT gift link)

A short, annotated analysis of Biery’s ruling that freed Liam and his father. Brilliant and not-so-subtle shade.

One of the many unsettling images to emerge from the recent ICE surge in Minneapolis was that of 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, in his blue bunny hat, standing in the January cold with the hand of a federal officer gripping his Spider-Man backpack.

Liam and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, an asylum seeker from Ecuador, were taken from Minnesota to Texas and held at a detention facility outside San Antonio. Lawyers working on their behalf filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus, an ancient judicial principle forbidding the government from holding anyone in custody without providing a legally tenable reason for doing so. On Saturday, Fred Biery, a federal judge in Texas’ Western District, granted their petition, freeing them.

[ms liberty]

1. K&R

[LetMyPeopleVote]

2. Judge denies DHS bid to rush removal of Liam Ramos and his family

Kristen Stenvik, superintendent of the district where Liam goes to school, said the ruling provides both “additional time” and “continued uncertainty.”

Judge denies DHS bid to rush removal of Liam Ramos and his family www.ms.now/news/dhs-rep...

— MS NOW (@ms.now) 2026-02-07T00:01:26.219Z

https://www.ms.now/news/dhs-reportedly-seeks-expedited-removal-of-liam-ramos-and-his-family

The Department of Homeland Security unsuccessfully sought to expedite deportation proceedings against the family of Liam Conejo Ramos, the 5-year-old formerly detained with his father by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials in Minneapolis, a local school official said Friday.

The government filed a motion Wednesday seeking to end asylum claims for Liam’s family, according to Minnesota Public Radio, which first reported the news Thursday night. MS NOW has not viewed the filing.

At an asylum hearing Friday, the family was granted a continuance, according to Kristen Stenvik, superintendent of Columbia Heights Public Schools, where Liam goes to school. Stenvik cited “a legal representative of the family” as the source of the information she shared......

Arias told Minnesota Public Radio the family’s future was uncertain.

“The government is moving many pieces. It’s doing everything possible to do us harm, so that they’ll probably deport us,” he said in Spanish, according to MPR’s translation. “We live with that fear, too.”

Stenvik previously told MS NOW four other children from the school district she presides over were in the same Texas detention facility where Liam and his father were. The school district shut down Monday after receiving a bomb threat.

In her latest statement, she said the Friday ruling provides both “additional time” and “continued uncertainty for a child and his family.”