LOS ANGELES — U.S. immigration officials continue to release the names and alleged criminal histories of some people detained in recent illegal immigration raids in the Los Angeles area, even as the patrols have been effectively halted by a lawsuit challenging their legality.

What You Need To Know

  • U.S. immigration officials continue to release the names and alleged criminal histories of some people detained in recent illegal immigration raids in the Los Angeles

  • One post by ICE took issue with the city of Los Angeles’ so-called sanctuary policy, in which local officials are largely forbidden from cooperating with the U.S. government to enforce immigration laws

  • Attempts to reach the office of LA Mayor Karen Bass for comment were not immediately successful Sunday

  • On Friday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied the Trump administration’s bid to stay a temporary restraining order halting the government’s roving enforcement patrols

Among the detentions made by ICE Los Angeles and announced by Homeland Security Investigations are the following:

  • Alejandro Torres-Rivera, 29, of Mexico. Torres allegedly has previous charges for obstructing and resisting an officer, possession of unlawful paraphernalia and use/being under the influence of a controlled substance.
  • Jesus Sanchez-Avila, 39, of Mexico, arrested July 31. Sanchez allegedly has previous charges for robbery, carjacking, assault with a firearm and was sentenced to 19 years in prison for gang-related crimes.
  • Jose Antonio Meneses-Hernandez, 52, a Mexican national, arrested July 31. Meneses-Hernandez allegedly has previous charges for DUI, possession of a controlled substance and trespassing.

One post by ICE took issue with the city of Los Angeles’ so-called sanctuary policy, in which local officials are largely forbidden from cooperating with the U.S. government to enforce immigration laws.

Alongside a photo of a detainee, ICE posted the following on Sunday:

“This Mexican criminal alien sexually abused a child under 14 in Vista, Calif. His name’s Juan Ocana-Sanchez and ICE Los Angeles got him off the streets because he’s a CONVICTED child sex offender. LA sanctuary policy defenders: This is who you protect. Meanwhile, sanctuary policies put the public and VICTIMS at risk.”

Attempts to reach the office of LA Mayor Karen Bass for comment were not immediately successful Sunday. The offices of Council members Hugo-Soto- Martinez, Eunisses Hernandez and Nithya Ramen, who championed the 2024 ordinance that formally established LA as a “sanctuary city,” also did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

The 2024 ordinance closed loopholes in previous policy prohibiting city resources or personnel from being used to help federal enforcement of immigration laws.

On Friday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied the Trump administration’s bid to stay a temporary restraining order halting the government’s roving enforcement patrols. Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong ruled July 14 that the patrols were illegally conducted, largely based on targets’ race and without reasonable suspicion.

U.S. Department of Justice Attorney Jacob Roth insisted that the immigration stops — which began June 6 in the Los Angeles area — were perfectly legal, carefully targeted and conducted with probable cause to make arrests.

“The officers are instructed to find reasonable suspicion before an arrest,” Roth told the panel, adding that Frimpong’s restraining order “is fundamentally flawed on multiple levels.”

However, the three-member Court of Appeals panel, all Democratic appointees, appeared skeptical during last Monday’s oral arguments, and that was borne out by Friday’s ruling.

“If, as Defendants suggest, they are not conducting stops that lack reasonable suspicion, they can hardly claim to be irreparably harmed by an injunction aimed at preventing a subset of stops not supported by reasonable suspicion ,” the panel wrote.

An eventual appeal to the Supreme Court is expected, where six of the nine justices were appointed by Republican presidents.

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson took issue with the ruling.

“No federal judge has the authority to dictate immigration policy — that authority rests with Congress and the president,” Jackson said in a statement to City News Service. “Enforcement operations require careful planning and execution; skills far beyond the purview or jurisdiction of any judge. The Trump administration looks forward to continuing to implement its immigration policies lawfully.”

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials did not immediately respond to an inquiry about whether the raids would continue.

Bass praised the ruling.

“This is a victory for Los Angeles, and this is a victory because the people of Los Angeles stood together,” Bass told reporters Friday night outside Getty House, the mayor’s official residence.

“I think the administration might have believed that this was going to divide our city, that our city was going to go at each other in division, but we did not. We stood strong, and I am very happy to say that us standing strong … gave the court the resolve to uphold this decision.”

The rulings stem from Vasquez Perdomo v. Noem, a lawsuit filed July 2 by five individual plaintiffs and four plaintiff organizations, the Los Angeles Worker Center Network, United Farm Workers, Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, and Immigrant Defenders Law Center. The plaintiffs allege that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is operating a program of “abducting and disappearing” community members using unlawful arrest tactics, then confining detainees in illegal conditions while denying access to attorneys.

The suit also claims that federal officials have unconstitutionally arrested and detained people in order to meet arbitrary arrest quotas set by the Trump administration.

U.S. officials have denied the presence of a quota. Trump administration officials have defended the raids, pointing to the president’s many statements during the 2024 campaign pledging to carry out mass deportations of those here illegally, and touting the alleged criminal records of some detainees.

Frimpong has scheduled a hearing in the case on Sept. 24.