He was deported to Laos despite court order blocking removal

A father claiming U.S. citizenship was deported to Laos last month even as a federal judge ordered immigration authorities to keep him in the country, civil rights attorneys revealed in late October.

What happened: Chanthila “Shawn” Souvannarath, 44, reportedly departed on a flight from Baltimore to Laos on Oct. 24. Federal officials did not learn of Chief Judge Shelly D. Dick’s Oct. 23 temporary restraining order until just before 3 p.m. the following day, roughly about four hours after Souvannarath’s international flight took off.

His lawyers, according to NOLA.com, say he is now confined in a Lao jail, reaching his wife only by using a guard’s phone. Meanwhile, U.S. authorities “cannot confirm” where he is. In her restraining order, Dick wrote that Souvannarath presented a “substantial claim of U.S. citizenship” and would be “unable to effectively litigate his case from Laos,” finding deportation would cause “irreparable harm.”

About Souvannarath: Souvannarath entered the U.S. as an infant after being born in a Thai refugee camp and received lawful permanent residence. When his Laotian-born father gained U.S. citizenship through naturalization in 1988, Souvannarath contends he automatically became a citizen under derivative citizenship provisions that existed in immigration law at that time. In 2004, however, Washington state courts convicted him of unlawful firearm possession and second-degree assault related to domestic violence, leading immigration authorities to issue a deportation order in 2006.

On June 18, immigration agents took him into custody during a scheduled Alabama check-in that his two younger children witnessed, his wife Beatrice told AP News. Authorities then transferred him to the Camp 57 facility at Angola prison.

What this means: Souvannarath’s case reveals systemic weaknesses affecting refugees and their families who face challenges establishing citizenship status through documentation. “This should alarm everyone,” said Bridget Pranzatelli, staff attorney at the National Immigration Project, adding that federal agencies “cannot simply ignore the other branches of government.”

Beyond the immediate court order violation, mass detention creates conditions where people pursuing federal claims, including possible citizens, can be removed without adequate legal protections, according to advocates. Nora Ahmed, legal director of the ACLU of Louisiana, characterized the deportation as “a catastrophic failure of the immigration system,” raising concerns about others wrongfully deported from what she termed “jails masquerading as ‘immigration detention centers.’”

Civil rights organizations representing Souvannarath say they are pursuing every legal avenue to bring him back and ensure ICE faces consequences for the court order violation.