Polk County is facing more lawsuits brought by individuals detained in the county jail by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Polk, Woodbury, Muscatine and other Iowa counties have been sued by numerous jail inmates in recent months, each alleging they’ve been unlawfully detained in county jails by ICE and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
An exact count of all the lawsuits against Iowa jails is difficult to calculate given the fact that Iowa’s county jails typically don’t disclose the names of inmates who are being held at the direction of ICE. In addition, public access to the federal court records related to those detentions is tightly restricted.
However, the available records show Polk County, ICE and DHS are named as defendants in at least three additional cases recently filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Iowa.
Lt. Mark Chance of the Polk County Sheriff’s Office said Friday that 68 of the 993 inmates now housed at the Polk County Jail are detainees of DHS or ICE.
Nationally and in Iowa, many of the lawsuits surrounding ICE detainees involve the Trump administration’s six-month-old effort to expand its “mandatory detention” policy. Under that policy, ICE is holding people in jail indefinitely as their immigration cases proceed, while arguing those individuals are not entitled to a hearing where they can argue for their release on bond.
Politico recently reported that more than 300 federal judges, including appointees of every president since Ronald Reagan, have rejected the administration’s “mandatory detention” theory in more than 1,600 cases.
The courts’ near-universal rejection of the administration’s position has not prevented the U.S. Department of Justice from continuing to use that rationale to jail people indefinitely. In fact, the DOJ recently appealed one judge’s ruling against ICE after it resulted in a woman’s release from the Muscatine County Jail.
Polk County man detained during traffic stop
One of the newly filed cases involves Ulises Ramirez Cruz, who sued Polk County and ICE over his detention and the refusal of the immigration courts to provide him with a hearing at which he could argue for his release on bond.
Court records indicate Ramirez Cruz has lived in Iowa for five years. He alleges that ICE agents — identified in court records only as T. Staudinger, Scroggins, Palmer and Hanson — waited outside his house on Nov. 7, 2025, and then pulled him over after he left the house, got into his car and drove away.
U.S. Attorney David Waterman argued in court that Ramirez Cruz is not entitled to a bond hearing and is subject to mandatory detention. In a recent ruling against the government, U.S. District Court Judge Stephen Locher noted he has rejected the DOJ’s arguments in at least three other cases that have come before him, and that judges around the country have “overwhelmingly” issued similar decisions.
Locher’s order directs the immigration court to provide Ramirez Cruz with an opportunity to argue for his release on bond while the underlying immigration case proceeds.
‘Punitive detention’ alleged in Polk County case
The second recent case involves a Polk County Jail inmate, Luis Pedroso, a citizen of Cuba who has been in the United States for four and a half years. Pedroso has applied for status as a legal permanent resident of the United States, but as part of the approval process, he must prove he’s not ineligible on public-health grounds, which would involve a physical examination to rule out drug abuse and communicable diseases.
Under federal regulations, that examination must be provided by a physician selected by or approved by immigration authorities. Attorneys for Pedroso argue that the jail, Polk County Health Department and ICE are all unwilling or unable to provide Pedroso with a physician so the examination can be conducted. ICE is also unwilling to transfer Pedroso to a different jail so the examination can take place, they allege.
Pedroso’s attorneys claim ICE and the county have, in effect, denied Pedroso his status as a legal permanent resident and violated his right to due process.
“Keeping Pedroso in detention for the purpose of adjudicating his claim in immigration court transforms his detention into a punitive detention intending to punish him for the fact that he is eligible for legal permanent residency,” the lawsuit alleges.
The defendants in the case have yet to file a response.
U.S. resident for 35 years, in jail for four months
A third lawsuit involving the Polk County Jail revolves around Amir Rahimi of Centerville, a native of Iran who has lived in the United States for 35 years.
In his lawsuit against the county, ICE and DHS, Rahimi alleges he has been married to a native-born U.S. citizen for 33 years, with whom he has three children. The couple’s eldest son is in the U.S. Air Force and is currently deployed overseas, the lawsuit claims.
Rahimi alleges he was detained by federal agents when he stopped at an ICE office for a routine, scheduled appointment on July 22, 2025. At the time, he claims, ICE gave no reason for his detention except to tell him they were currently “seeking a third country for your removal” — suggesting the agency’s plan is to deport him not to Iran, but to some other country.
“After four months of detention, the legal justification for his detention still remains unclear and he has been provided with no explanation of the change in his circumstances that resulted in the deprivation of his liberty,” the lawsuit alleges.
The lawsuit seeks a court order preventing Rahimi’s continued detention, citing alleged violations of Rahimi’s due process rights and the federal Immigration and Nationality Act.
Feds appeal ruling in Muscatine County case
In addition to the newly filed lawsuits, a fourth lawsuit involving the Muscatine County Jail continues to move forward despite a judge’s ruling in the case in early November.
That case centers on Maria Enriquez Reyes, who entered the United States from Mexico near Sasabe, Arizona, on Sept. 23, 2023, with her son, now 10 years old, and her husband. At the time, the family claimed they were fleeing persecution. They were detained briefly by the U.S. Border Patrol before being released on their own recognizance.
Reyes and her family subsequently filed formal applications for asylum to escape what they called persecution by Mexican drug cartels that are now recognized as terrorists by the U.S. government.
On Sept. 2, 2025, with that application still pending, the Reyes family went to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Cedar Rapids for a prescheduled “check in” appointment. According to court records, ICE agents accosted Reyes at the office and then sent her to the Muscatine County Jail. An immigration judge then denied her request for a bond hearing.
Reyes sued in U.S. District Court, and on Nov. 3, 2025, Judge Locher ruled in her favor, noting that the majority of courts around the nation have rejected the administration’s interpretation of the law as requiring mandatory detention.
Locher noted that Reyes has lived in the United States with her family for two years and has no record of any criminal activity or dangerous conduct.
In ordering the immigration court to provide Reyes with a hearing on her request for pretrial release on bond, Locher wrote that “ICE itself obviously did not believe she was subject to mandatory detention” when they released her on how own recognizance in September 2023 and again in February 2025.
Court records indicate Reyes was granted bond after a hearing on Nov. 7, 2025, and was released from custody three days later on a $6,000 bond.
Despite Locher’s ruling and Reyes’ subsequent release, the U.S. Department of Justice is now appealing Locher’s ruling.
