Description

Three Bay Area families who were separated at the U.S.–Mexico border in 2018 filed suit this morning against the U.S. government seeking damages for the harm immigration officials inflicted on them by subjecting them to the Trump administration’s inhumane and unlawful policy of forcible family separation at the border.  

The plaintiff parents, Wilbur P.G., Erendira C.M., and Joshua G.G.*, and their children are the first affected families to file suit for damages in Northern California and are represented by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area and Keker, Van Nest & Peters, LLP.

In addition to seeking damages to compensate for the lifelong harm caused by the separation itself, the suit seeks to hold the federal government accountable for other abuses the families suffered while jailed in federal immigration detention facilities, including one parent who sustained lasting physical injuries after being denied medical attention and a child who was sexually abused in custody. 

On January 5^th 2022, the U.S. government filed a motion to dismiss, requesting a federal judge dismiss the case.

On May 10, 2022, the judge denied that motion and ordered that the case proceed.

In September 2023, the Court granted the request of three Bay Area families forcibly separated at the border to depose former Attorney General Jeff Sessions and former Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen.

Important Documents

• Press Release
• Complaint
• Order Denying Motion to Dismiss Or Transfer
• Plaintiffs’ Trial Brief
• Press Release

Outcome

In 2024 we negotiated a favorable settlement that provides some measure of compensation to families cruelly separated by government policy, though no amount of money erases the harm caused by the family separation policy.