A divided panel of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit on Friday shut down a district court’s move toward criminal-contempt prosecutions of federal officials involved in the rapid removal of suspected Tren de Aragua members this spring, granting the government’s petition for a writ of mandamus and vacating the lower court’s probable-cause order.
The DC Circuit dismissed the government’s interlocutory appeal for lack of jurisdiction. Judges Gregory Katsas and Neomi Rao concluded the extraordinary remedy of mandamus was warranted and ordered the district court’s probable-cause finding wiped away, but Judge Cornelia Pillard dissented from the mandamus grant.
The panel held that it lacked appellate jurisdiction to review the district court’s April 16 order at this stage. Even so, the majority said mandamus was appropriate because the temporary restraining order (TRO) at the heart of the contempt dispute was too ambiguous to support criminal contempt and because the district court
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