ICE releases Tennessee Spanish-language reporter on bond

Rodríguez Flórez, a reporter for Nashville Noticias, was released Thursday after posting a bond that a judge had recently allowed, her attorneys said. They described the release as a step toward resolving what they call a wrongful detention case stemming from her arrest earlier this month.

Her lawyers said Rodríguez Flórez was arrested on March 4 during a traffic stop and taken into ICE custody. They said she was held in Etowah County, Alabama, before being transferred to the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center in Basile, Louisiana.

“We are grateful that Estefany is able to walk away with her freedom to be with her family as she continues to fight for her right to remain in her community and in the US,” Mike Holley, an attorney for Rodríguez, said in a statement.

Court filings cited by her lawyer said Rodríguez Flórez is a Colombian citizen who entered the United States lawfully and has lived there for the past five years. Her attorneys said she has a valid work permit and has applied for political asylum and legal status through her U.S.-citizen husband.

Her attorneys said she has no criminal history and has maintained a steady employment record, community ties and a 7-year-old daughter at home. They said her case involves allegations that her detention violated constitutional protections, including her First Amendment rights and Fifth Amendment due process rights.

In their wrongful detention challenge, Rodríguez Flórez’s attorneys also raised Fourth Amendment claims related to what they described as an unlawful, warrantless seizure. Her attorneys said authorities did not have a reason to think she was likely to escape before a warrant could be obtained, and they challenged the arrest-warrant paperwork described by federal authorities, including claims that it was dated two days before the arrest and appeared improperly completed. Her attorneys said a separate warrant was then typed up and dated March 4.

The attorneys also described delays in scheduling a meeting connected to her immigration case. They said ICE twice rescheduled a meeting with Rodríguez, first citing a winter storm closure and then stating an agent could not find her appointment in the system. They said a new meeting was set for March 17.

They also said it took more than 10 days after her arrest before Rodríguez’s attorney, Joel Coxander, was able to speak with her in the manner he requested. Her attorneys said Rodríguez was with her husband in a marked Nashville Noticias vehicle when multiple vehicles surrounded them, leading to her being taken to a detention center.

Rodríguez’s attorneys said she was later moved to a county jail in Alabama, and after a day there, before she was scheduled to be flown to Louisiana, an officer asked if she had lice and she was taken back to the jail. They said she was held in isolation for about five days and then was forced to strip in a shower room where, according to the filing, an officer poured a chemical liquid on her head that burned her eyes.

The AP account said Rodríguez was transferred to Louisiana on March 12, and later that an immigration judge in Louisiana set a $10,000 bond for her release on Monday. Her attorneys said her release followed her payment of that bond Thursday, and Holley said they plan to press for not only her full release but also an order that would prohibit ICE from mistreating her in a similar way in the future.

The U.S. government, as described in the AP report, said there was no First Amendment or due process violation, characterizing decisions on removal proceedings as discretionary and saying First Amendment protections “may not even be applicable” to an individual the government described as an illegal alien.

Separate from the case file, the report also said that multiple press associations submitted a legal brief warning about potential pitfalls from arresting reporters who are not U.S. citizens. That brief, led by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, argued that detention and arrest could end speech and chill future reporting, particularly by noncitizen journalists reporting on sensitive topics.