Federal judge in WV rules that masked ICE agents violate the Fourth Amendment
By Stephen Baldwin, RealWV
CHARLESTON, WV – Calling the tactics of Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) under the Trump Administration “an assault on the constitutional order,” US District Judge Joseph Goodwin ordered that Anderson Jesus Urquilla-Ramos be released from custody in a decision rendered on Thursday.
“On January 7, 2026, Petitioner, a 21-year-old national of El Salvador, was ‘arrested, abruptly and without warning by a group of masked men purporting to be’ Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) officers. Petitioner was eventually detained at South Central Regional Jail in Charleston, West Virginia.”
Goodwin wrote a pointed decision with far-reaching implications, which began, “Across the interior of the United States, agents of the federal government—masked, anonymous, armed with military weapons, operating from unmarked vehicles, acting without warrants of any kind—are seizing persons for civil immigration violations and imprisoning them without any semblance of due process. The systematic character of this practice and its deliberate elimination of every structural feature that distinguishes constitutional authority from raw force place it beyond the reach of ordinary legal description.”
Urquilla-Ramos was represented by Omar Baloch of Raleigh, N.C., and by William Shane Wilson of Wilson Legal Group in Charleston. They argued that their client’s Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights were violated. Goodwin said, “I agree.”
“Petitioner was arrested by unidentifiable, masked officers acting without a warrant, without articulable justification for concealing their identities, and with no mechanism by which he could identify those seizing him or meaningfully test the legality of their asserted Authority.”
Goodwin later in the decision addressed the now-standard practice of ICE agents to wear masks while on the job, rejecting that practice as unconstitutional.
“In a system of checks and balances, the policy of officer anonymity violates the Constitution by evading accountability and judicial review.”
He further elucidated the point, writing, “Stops without identification must remain rare exceptions, not routine practice.”
Goodwin said the government has begun using such masked stops as routine practice rather than rare exceptions when operationally required, thereby damaging the constitution. “A law enforcement practice whose sole operational effect is the elimination of accountability is not a safety measure. It is a constitutional deficiency wearing the name of one.”
In his conclusion, Goodwin stated, “A law enforcement practice whose sole operational effect is the elimination of accountability is not a safety measure. It is a constitutional deficiency wearing the name of one.”
To read the full decision, visit here to access it via Bloomberg Law.
