A federal judge issued a temporary restraining order Tuesday that blocks the Trump administration from removing a 5-year-old boy who was detained by immigration authorities in Minnesota last week.
Liam Conejo Ramos was taken with his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, after the pair returned home Jan. 20 from Liam’s preschool, according to Zena Stenvik, the superintendent of Columbia Heights Public Schools. A witness said she heard an adult inside the home pleading with agents to leave the child.
The Department of Homeland Security said Conejo Arias fled from agents who approached his car, leaving Liam.
“For the child’s safety, one of our ICE officers remained with the child while the other officers apprehended Conejo Arias,” DHS said.
Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin denied accusations that the child was targeted, saying Liam’s mother refused officers’ attempts to have her take custody of the boy. His father agreed to keep Liam in his care.
DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment after Tuesday’s decision.
Both Liam and his father were moved from Minnesota to Texas, and the restraining order says they are in the Dilley Immigration Processing Center.
Tuesday’s order prevents them from being removed or transferred outside the District of Western Texas pending a further directive from the court.
The case has drawn scrutiny from critics who have accused Immigration and Customs Enforcement of using children as “bait.”
McLaughlin, the DHS spokesperson, has defended the agency’s actions.
“Our officers made multiple attempts to get the alleged mother who was inside the house to take custody of her child,” she said in a statement.”Officers even assured her she would NOT be taken her into custody. The alleged mother refused to accept custody of the child.”
School board Chair Mary Granlund said she was driving to pick up her own children when she saw activity near the family’s house. She insisted that she saw Liam’s mother inside the home and that her husband yelled that she shouldn’t open the door, fearing that immigration officers would go inside.
Granlund said someone referred to her in saying a representative from the district was there and could assume responsibility for Liam.
“There was ample opportunity to be able to safely hand that child off to adults,” Granlund said.
The family’s attorney, Marc Prokosch, said they entered the United States in 2023 after having booked an appointment through the CBP One app. The app was set up during the Biden administration to create an orderly way for migrants to enter the U.S. and to reduce illegal border crossings, but President Donald Trump shut it down last year.
“This family was not eluding ICE in any way,” Prokosch said last week. “They were following all the established protocols pursuing their claim for asylum, showing up for their court hearings, and pose no safety, no flight risk never should have been detained.”
Attorneys representing the Conejo Arias family were not immediately available for comment after the judge’s order Tuesday.
5-Year-Old Minnesota Boy Fell ‘Ill’ and ‘Is Not Doing Great’ in ICE Detention: ‘He’s Been Depressed and Sad’
Liam Conejo Ramos, whose encounter with ICE in Minnesota went viral earlier this month, has reportedly not been feeling well since he and his father were taken to a detention center in Texas
NEED TO KNOW
- A 5-year-old Minnesota boy who was detained by ICE alongside his father earlier this month has fallen ill at the Texas detention center where they are being held
- “I’m very, very concerned about his well-being in that facility,” the superintendent of Liam Conejo Ramos’ Minnesota school district told Huffington Post
- Leecia Welch, the chief legal counsel at Children’s Rights, recently told PEOPLE that illness has been an issue in the family detainment center this winter, sharing that when she visited recently to check in on children’s conditions, “Pretty much everyone we talked to was sick”
Liam Conejo Ramos, 5, has reportedly not been feeling well since he was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Minnesota earlier this month.
Zena Stenvik, the superintendent for Liam’s Columbia Heights Public Schools District, told Huffington Post that she’d spoken to the boy’s mother, Erika Ramos, on Tuesday, Jan. 27, and it was clear she was “incredibly distraught” about the situation.
“Unfortunately, Liam’s health is not doing great right now,” Stenvik told the outlet. “He’s been ill. I’ve been told he has a fever. So I’m very, very concerned about his well-being in that facility,” referring to the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas, where the father and son are being detained.
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The comments came after Liam’s mom told Minnesota Public Radio earlier this week that her son and her husband, Adrian Conejo Arias, were still being held.
“The situation of my husband Adrian and my son Liam inside the detention center is deeply concerning,” Erika told MPR News on Monday, Jan. 26.
“Liam is getting sick because the food they receive is not of good quality. He has stomach pain, he’s vomiting, he has a fever and he no longer wants to eat,” Erika said.
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Democratic Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro visited Liam and his dad at the family residential center in Dilley on Wednesday, Jan. 28.
He documented his visit on social media, saying in a video message on X that he’d spent around 30 minutes with the father and son, but Liam hadn’t been awake at the time.
Castro stressed that it wasn’t an “emergency” physically regarding Liam, but said in the clip, “His dad said that he hasn’t been himself, he’s been sleeping a lot because he’s been depressed and sad.”
Castro pointed out that “the whole country’s been worried about him,” as well as “his school and his classmates and his principal, his legal team and his mom” have been “worried sick.”
Castro spoke to CNN on Wednesday, saying that Liam had been asking about the knitted blue hat and Spider-Man backpack that he’d been wearing in the heartbreaking images showing him being detained, which circulated online.
“He keeps asking about that hat and that backpack that are in the picture,” the congressman said, per the outlet. “I think they took that from him.”
Castro posted a photograph of himself with a sleeping Liam and his dad on Instagram on Wednesday, writing in the caption, “Just visited with Liam and his father at Dilley detention center. I demanded his release and told him how much his family, his school, and our country loves him and is praying for him.”
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t immediately respond when contacted by PEOPLE for comment. PEOPLE has also attempted to reach out to Castro.
DHS previously claimed Liam’s father, who is from Ecuador, entered the country illegally in December 2024. But the family’s attorney, Marc Prokosch, said they entered lawfully at a border crossing in Brownsville, Texas.
DHS has alleged that Liam’s father fled from agents during the arrest, leaving his son behind, and that Liam’s mother, who was inside their home on the day the pair were detained, had “refused to accept custody” of the boy. DHS said the father eventually told agents he wanted Liam to remain with him.
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Leecia Welch, chief legal counsel at Children’s Rights, recently told PEOPLE that illness has been an issue in the Dilley, Texas, detainment center this winter, sharing that when she visited recently to check in on the conditions, “Pretty much everyone we talked to was sick.”
One 16-year-old told her he’d gotten sick seven times in the facility.
“People should understand that detention of children, whether it’s with their families or not, is inhumane and un-American,” Welch said. “We’ve met with hundreds of children in detention facilities, and far too many of these children were showing signs of trauma, even after short periods of being detained.”
Welch told PEOPLE that children have exhibited extreme sadness, despondency and depression, and some had been having panic attacks as a result of their detainment.
“Some of the conditions of confinement and treatment that we have been monitoring over the many months, include denial of critical medical care,” she said, adding that during a visit in November, families said worms and mold were in their food, resulting in children becoming sick.
“Families have been threatened with family separation there,” she continued. “And so there’s a range of concerns that we’ve heard over these months.”
A spokesperson for Liam’s Columbia Heights Public Schools District told PEOPLE in an email that the boy “is one of four students that we know of who have been picked up by ICE in our community.”
“The continued detention of children, and actions that pull families apart has no place anywhere, especially not in a community built around schools,” they added.
“Our request is for a ceasing of this terror in our community and a return to a sense of normalcy so students can learn and staff can teach. We need families to be reunited and for the lawlessness of the immigration actions to cease,” the spokesperson said.
Judge blocks possible deportation of Minnesota 5-year-old for now
The preschooler and his father won’t immediately be deported, a judge ruled.
SAN ANTONIO — A 5-year-old boy taken to a detention center in Texas with his father will not be deported for the time being, a federal judge ruled.
The story of Liam Ramos, a preschooler in Columbia Heights, caught public attention last week as an image of him being detained wearing a bunny hat and Spiderman backpack went viral. The detainment has garnered criticism, with Columbia Heights Public Schools Superintendent Zena Stenvik saying, “You can’t tell me this child is going to be classified as a violent criminal.”
He was detained along with his father. Their attorney, Marc Prokosch, said the father is not an “illegal alien” and has been following the law in seeking asylum. According to Prokosch, the family entered the U.S. in 2024 through a port of entry, has been following the legal process, appearing at court hearings, and does not pose a safety risk. He said they “did everything right when they came in,” and the boy’s detainment is “inhumane and unacceptable.” Prokosch added that he has not been able to find any criminal charges against the boy’s father in Minnesota. KARE 11 has also not been able to find criminal charges.
The Department of Homeland Security claims its agents tried to get Liam’s mother to take the boy but she allegedly refused and “abandoned” him. Columbia Heights school board chair Mary Granlund disputes this, saying she was there when the detainment was taking place and the mother was not outside.
In an order issued Monday, a federal judge said “any possible or anticipated removal or transfer” of Liam and his father is “immediately stayed” until further order from the court, and that the Department of Homeland Security should not transfer the two out of the judicial district during litigation.
The Columbia Heights School District stated last week that ICE agents had detained four of its students, including Ramos.
On Tuesday, Superintendent Stenvik says Ramos and another student are in Texas detention centers, a third student is back home in Minnesota and another is unaccounted for.
“I feel like this is one small step in getting Liam back and the whole family reunited again,” said Stenvik. “But we want all of the children back who are detained; they’re children, they should be back home with their families.”
In a new statement on Tuesday, DHS Spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin wrote, “The facts in this case have NOT changed: ICE did NOT target or arrest a child. On January 20, ICE conducted a targeted operation to arrest Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias an illegal alien from Ecuador who was RELEASED into the U.S. by the Biden administration. As agents approached, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias fled on foot—abandoning his child. For the child’s safety, one of our ICE officers remained with the child while the other officers apprehended Conejo Arias. Our officers made multiple attempts to get the alleged mother who was inside the house to take custody of her child. Officers even assured her she would NOT be taken her into custody. The alleged mother refused to accept custody of the child. The father told officers he wanted the child to remain with him. The Trump administration is committed to restoring the rule of law and common sense to our immigration system, and will continue to fight for the arrest, detention, and removal of aliens who have no right to be in this country.”
Democratic Congressman Joaquin Castro and Democratic Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett also announced they are planning to visit the Dilley Detention Center on Wednesday where Ramos and his father are being held.
