A federal judge in Colorado on Wednesday temporarily blocked the Trump administration from deporting the family of Mohamed Sabry Soliman, the man charged in the firebombing attack in Boulder, Colorado, on Sunday.
The US district court judge Gordon Gallagher granted a request to halt deportation proceedings of Soliman’s wife and five children, after they were taken into federal custody on Tuesday by US immigration authorities.
“The court finds that deportation without process could work irreparable harm and an order must issue without notice due to the urgency this situation presents,” Gallagher wrote in the order.
Soliman, an Egyptian national, is facing federal and state charges over the attack on a crowd of people who were demonstrating in support of Israeli hostages who remain captive in Gaza. His family members have not been charged.
Related: Family of suspect in Colorado fire attack taken into custody of US immigration
The homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, announced on Tuesday that immigration agents were taking Soliman’s wife and five children into custody and that federal officials are investigating whether his family knew about plans for the attack.
The New York Times also quoted a DHS spokesperson saying the family’s valid visas had been revoked. Family members of a person accused of a crime are rarely detained and threatened with deportation.
Lawyers representing his family sued the government on Wednesday seeking to win their release from custody and block their deportation, according to court documents.
They argued it was “patently unlawful to punish individuals for the crimes of their relatives”, adding that “such methods of collective or family punishment violates the very foundations of a democratic justice system”.
Hayam El Gamal, the wife of Soliman, was “shocked to learn that her husband was arrested for having committed a violent act against a peaceful gathering of individuals commemorating Israeli hostages”, the lawyers wrote.
The lawsuit called for the family to be released while they seek asylum in the US. Soliman’s wife, 18-year-old daughter, two minor sons and two minor daughters are all Egyptian citizens, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
The DHS did not immediately respond to request for comment.
The Trump administration has quickly seized on Soliman’s immigration status to promote its mass deportation agenda.
Soliman, who was born in Egypt, was in the US on an expired tourist visa after entering the country in 2022. He applied for asylum that year and received work authorization that later expired, according to the DHS.
Earlier on Wednesday, authorities raised the number of victims injured in the attack from 12 to 15 individuals, plus a dog. Those wounded include eight women and seven men between the ages of 25 and 88.
Reuters contributed reporting
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