A Texas federal judge on Monday ordered the release of an Egyptian family of six, including 5-year-old twins, who are believed to be among the longest detained at the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, the only federal immigrant facility authorized to hold parents with their children.
The decision by a U.S. magistrate judge in Texas is a major development in the nearly year-long saga of the family who has for months raised serious alarms about medical neglect and rotting food as they begged for their release. Last week the family’s lawyers said the mother was rushed to the emergency room, after months of suffering from an unidentified bump, which she feared may be cancerous due to her family history, possibly heightened by the lack of medical care at the detention center.
“A federal court has ruled that the Trump administration is violating the Constitution by detaining the El Gamal family,” the family’s lawyer, Michigan-based Eric Lee, said in a statement. ”We feel vindicated, but despite the court’s ruling, the family has not yet been released. After 10 and a half months we demand the executive branch release them immediately.”
Spokespeople for the Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review, which oversees the immigration courts, did not immediately respond to questions.
The El Gamal family, who came to the U.S. on a tourist visa in 2022 and later applied for asylum, have been detained since last June after the father, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, was charged with attacking mostly Jewish protesters in Boulder, Colo., accused of throwing Molotov cocktails at demonstrators supporting Israeli hostages. He allegedly wounded at least 29 people and an 82-year-old woman died from her injuries. The father, who pleaded not guilty, remains in federal custody on more than 100 charges related to the incident.
His wife, who said she met her husband in an arranged marriage, and her five children, have not been charged with any crimes and have repeatedly maintained that they did not know about Soliman’s plans and had an estranged relationship with him. The family has since disavowed the father and is no longer in contact with him, their attorney said, and his wife has filed for divorce.
Nevertheless when the family was detained last June, the White House tweeted, “Six One-Way Tickets for Mohamed’s Wife and Five Kids. Final Boarding Call Coming Soon.”
The family garnered widespread public attention this year after their lawyers shared heartbreaking accounts in the children’s own words and drawings of the harm they were suffering at Dilley.
“We have been here for nine months. I really miss playing with my toys and my watch,” wrote the 9-year-old in accounts first shared with The Texas Tribune. “Please get us out of here.”
The 16-year-old wrote, “I have seen with my own eyes, food that has mold in it. I even saw food with actual worms.”
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