A Mexican transgender migrant seeking asylum in the U.S. after allegedly being abducted and raped by cartel members has been ordered released from an all-male Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facility by a federal judge on due process grounds.

U.S. District Court Judge Amy Baggio, a President Joe Biden appointee, ordered the migrant released from the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, Washington, ruling that the asylum seeker had been deprived of liberty without proper procedural safeguards.

The migrant, a 24-year-old transgender woman identified as “O-J-M” in court documents, was arrested outside a Portland courtroom last month and transferred to the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, Washington. 

Judge Amy Margaret Baggio speaks during her Senate judiciary nomination hearing. Baggio ordered ICE to release a transgender asylum seeker who was held for over 40 days in a men’s facility after being arrested outside a Portland courtroom. (U.S. Senate)

 but he had not been granted access to her since her transfer.

O-J-M was arrested outside a Portland courtroom last month and transferred to the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, Washington.  (Christopher Dilts/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

“They threatened to kill her because O-J-M is a transgender woman,” her habeas petition states, per OPB. “Fearing for her life, she fled and sought asylum in the United States in September 2023.”

Manning told Willamette Weekly that his client had not committed a crime while in the U.S. O-J-M has regularly checked in at ICE offices as instructed.

Oregon sanctuary laws prevent it from having long-term immigration detention facilities, and — aside from temporary holding cells at the Portland ICE office — the nearest immigration detention center is the Tacoma facility.