Carmen Aracely Pablo Sequen v. Sergio Albarran

About the case

Carmen Aracely Pablo Sequen, an asylum seeker, began this case with a habeas petition after ICE arrested her as she left a hearing at the San Francisco immigration court. An amended complaint added class claims, and the court later severed the individual habeas claims. On June 23, 2026, the court certified a courthouse-arrest class ("[a]ll persons who have an immigration court hearing in a proceeding on EOIR's non-detained docket in an immigration courthouse in ICE's San Francisco Area of Responsibility") and a detention class, granted partial summary judgment on the APA claims, and vacated ICE Policy Nos. 11072.3 and 11072.4, EOIR OPPM 25-06 and ICE's June 24, 2025 Nationwide Hold Room Waiver as arbitrary and capricious. It declined the government's request to limit relief to the classes because the policies apply nationwide by their own terms. The court entered a Rule 54(b) judgment on June 30, the government appealed on July 2, and the court denied a stay pending appeal on July 10. The government later voluntarily dismissed three earlier appeals in the case. Claims about conditions at ICE's San Francisco holding facility at 630 Sansome Street remain in the district court. On November 5, 2026, the district court heard argument on ECF 235, the motion to enforce the separate detention-conditions preliminary injunction, and took it under submission. The minutes direct a joint consolidated sealing motion and state that an order will issue; they do not decide enforcement.

Relief

The vacatur sets aside the policies themselves and is not limited to the parties or the certified classes. It doesn't reach criminal immigration enforcement actions or civil arrests authorized by ICE's pre-2025 policy (ECF 222). The November 25, 2025 preliminary injunction on conditions at 630 Sansome Street is a separate order.

What's next

District order on the detention-conditions enforcement motion, ECF 235, following the November 5 hearing, and the joint consolidated sealing motion. Later appellate action and briefing changes in Ninth Circuit No. 26-4310 remain unverified.