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OPINION OF THE COURT
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FUENTES, Circuit Judge.
A 1996 law requires that the Executive Branch take
into custody any person who is removable from this country
because he has committed, among other things, a crime
involving moral turpitude or a crime involving a controlled
substance. See Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant
Responsibility Act of 1996 (IIRIRA), Pub. L. No. 104-208,
303, 110 Stat. 3009-585-86 (1996) (codified at 8 U.S.C.
1226(c)). Detention under this authority is mandatory, does
not provide for the possibility of release on bond, and does
not require that the Executive Branch at any time justify its
conduct. Pursuant to this law, the petitioner in this case,
Cheikh Diop, was detained for 1,072 daystwo years, eleven
months, and five days. The District Court concluded that
such prolonged detention was lawful. We disagree. For the
following reasons, we conclude that the statute authorizes
only detention for a reasonable period of time. After that, the
Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the
Constitution requires that the Government establish that
continued detention is necessary to further the purposes of the
detention statute.
I.
Although the merits of the immigration case against
Diop are not before us, we chronicle his journey through our
complex immigration system in order to illustrate how
individual actions by various actors in the immigration
system, each of which takes only a reasonable amount of time
to accomplish, can nevertheless result in the detention of a
removable alien for an unreasonable, and ultimately
unconstitutional, period of time.
Days 1-198. The story begins with Diops receipt of a
Notice to Appear from the Department of Homeland Security
(DHS) on March 19, 2008, charging him as a removable
alien who had entered the United States unlawfully and as an
alien convicted of a crime involving moral turpitude, a 2005
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Appx 562, 563 (9th Cir. 2008), lending further support to the
conclusion that Diops freedom is based on little more than
governmental grace, subject to change at its discretion. 6 And
finally, in its briefs here the Government argued that Diop
could be detained on the basis of his 2005 conviction. In
short, it is reasonable for Diop to fear that he might once
again be the subject of lengthy removal proceedings and preremoval detention at any time. His appeal falls into an
exception to the mootness rule.
Even if Diops case did not fall into the exception for
cases capable of repetition yet evading review, we would still
conclude that he maintains his standing in this appeal. In
Camreta v. Greene, the Supreme Court held that government
officials retained standing to challenge an appellate court
ruling that they had violated the Fourth Amendment, even
though that same court found that the government officials
had immunity and, therefore, could not be ordered to pay
money damages. 564 U.S ---, slip op. at 5-7. The Supreme
Court reasoned that in situations where an official regularly
engages in the conduct deemed unconstitutional, the
judgment results in a continuing injury because the official
then operates in the shadow of potential liability. So long as
[the judgment] continues in effect, [the official] must either
change the way he performs his duties or risk a meritorious
damages action. Id. at 7. Only by overturning the ruling on
appeal can the official gain clearance to engage in the conduct
in the future. . . . [C]onversely, if the person who initially
brought the suit may again be subject to the challenged
conduct, she has a stake in preserving the courts holding.
Id.
Camreta differs from this case in important respects.
Here, there are no money damages at issue. Also, the District
Court found that the Governments conduct did not violate
the Constitution. Nevertheless, Camreta provides a helpful
lesson in standing that is applicable to this case. Here, even
without the potential for monetary damages that existed in
6
This court has a longstanding policy of not citing to notprecedential decisions. We cite to McLeod not to make any
substantive legal point, but only to show that the Government
has assumed a different litigating position in similar cases.
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IV.
Diop maintains a reasonable expectation that he may,
once again, find himself imprisoned while the authorities sort
through the complicated laws and procedures governing the
removal of criminal aliens. Should he be detained once
again, our holding provides that he may only be detained for a
reasonable length of time. Should the length of his detention
become unreasonable, the Government must justify its
continued authority to detain him at a hearing at which it
bears the burden of proof. For all of the foregoing reasons,
we will vacate the District Courts decision and order
dismissing Diops petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus.
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