Donna Hughes-Brown
NION-003 · Held 143 days over two bad checks worth under $60 · Chicago, IL · 2025-07-29
- Case ID
- NION-003
- Age
- 58
- Legal status
- Lawful permanent resident
- Agency
- ICE
- Location
- Chicago, IL
- Incident date
- 2025-07-29
- Abuse type
- Excessive Detention; Unnecessary Arrest
- Verification tier
- T1 Third-party evidence of the incident, or court order
Summary
On July 29, 2025, Donna Hughes-Brown, a 58-year-old lawful permanent resident who had lived in the United States since she was 11, was detained at Chicago O'Hare returning from a family funeral in Ireland. The stated basis was two bad checks written to a grocery store in 2012 and 2015, together worth under $60, for which she had paid restitution and completed probation. She was held 143 days, most of it in a Kentucky county jail. On December 18, 2025 an immigration judge ended the removal proceedings and she was released.
What happened
INCIDENT DETAILS
On July 29, 2025, Donna Hughes-Brown landed at Chicago O'Hare on her way home from her aunt's funeral in Ireland. She was pulled aside at the border. Her husband was refused permission to go with her and was told she needed to sign some paperwork and would be on the next flight home.
Donna was instead arrested, transferred to ICE custody and placed in removal proceedings. Her husband's account describes her being driven from Illinois to Kentucky in a prisoner van, a journey of about six hours, without seatbelts and without food or water for twelve hours. He describes conditions he calls degrading, and says she was placed in an isolation cell in September after complaining that the food conflicted with a low sodium diet.
She was held for 143 days.
CHARGES AND LEGAL PROCEEDINGS
Donna Hughes-Brown was not charged with a crime.
AGENCY STATEMENTS
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, October 2025
"Hughes-Brown was referred to secondary inspection due to her prior criminal history, which includes two convictions for fraud involving the passing of bad checks, one in 2012 and another for 2015. Following the inspection, she was arrested and subsequently transferred to ICE custody, where she was placed in removal proceedings."
ICE published enforcement position, read into the congressional record November 19, 2025
"Under the leadership of President Trump and Secretary Noem, ICE is prioritizing the removal of criminal alien offenders who POSE a THREAT to the public safety and the rule of law. Individuals who are in the United States lawfully who have not violated immigration laws or committed crimes have no reason to fear enforcement actions."
Department of Homeland Security, December 2025
Questioned about the case by Rep. Seth Magaziner at a House Homeland Security Committee hearing, Secretary Kristi Noem thanked Jim Brown for his service and committed to review the case.
Requests for comment
ICE did not respond to a request for comment on her release.
Withdrawals and corrections
None. No agency has retracted the characterization of the two checks as convictions for fraud, or as crimes involving moral turpitude.
BEST OFFICER JUSTIFICATION
A lawful permanent resident with two qualifying offenses on her record is, by the plain text of the statute, an applicant for admission rather than a resident returning home. Once that is so, the law directs that she shall be detained if she is not clearly and beyond a doubt entitled to be admitted, and the officers at the port of entry had no authority to waive the category or to send her home. Whether a bad check conviction is a crime involving moral turpitude is a question of law for an immigration judge, not for an inspection booth. She did write the checks and has never denied it. The government's position throughout was that she was entitled to a hearing, which she received, and that the hearing would decide the question, which it did.
THE OUTCOME
On December 18, 2025, an immigration judge granted cancellation of removal. She was released after 143 days and remains a lawful permanent resident.
Cancellation of removal under 8 U.S.C. 1229b(a) requires five years as a permanent resident, seven years of continuous residence, and no aggravated felony. She had forty-eight years, forty-eight years, and none. She met every element on July 29, 2025, and on all 143 days that followed. Nothing about her eligibility changed between the day she was detained and the day she was released.
What changed was that eighteen United States senators signed a letter saying she should not be detained , and a member of Congress asked the Secretary of Homeland Security about her by name in a public hearing. Her husband is a decorated Navy combat veteran of twenty years and her son serves in the Marines. If the system worked here, it is worth asking what it does for the people held under the same statute who have no one to make that call on their behalf.
She has said she never sought citizenship because she did not want to give up her Irish identity, after four decades of living, working and paying taxes here. She now intends to take the test.
Evidence
- ICE public statement naming the two check convictions as the reason for her referral, arrest and removal proceedings, October 2025.
- Written testimony of Jim Brown to the House Committee on Homeland Security, November 19, 2025, giving the amounts and dates of the checks, the 2016 re-entry and the conditions of transport.
- Office of Rep. Seth Magaziner confirming cancellation of removal granted December 18, 2025.
- Fox19 WXIX report of her release, confirming 143 days in detention.
- The Irish Times report of her release, her age, and the letter signed by 18 United States senators.
- The Irish Times interview at the family home in Missouri, February 21, 2026.
- IrishCentral, aggregating The Irish Times, KXII and Newsweek, September 10, 2025.
- 8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(13)(C)(v), when a returning permanent resident is treated as seeking admission.
- 8 U.S.C. 1182(a)(2)(A), inadmissibility for a crime involving moral turpitude, and the petty offense exception.
- 8 U.S.C. 1225(b)(2)(A), mandatory detention of applicants for admission.
- 8 U.S.C. 1229b(a), cancellation of removal for permanent residents.
- 8 U.S.C. 1227(a)(2)(A)(i), deportability for a crime involving moral turpitude, which does not reach her.
- Jordan v. De George, 341 U.S. 223 (1951), fraud as the touchstone of moral turpitude, and the three justice dissent on vagueness.
- Matter of Bart, 20 I&N Dec. 436 (BIA 1992), a Georgia bad check conviction is a crime involving moral turpitude because intent to defraud is an essential element.
- Matter of Balao, 20 I&N Dec. 440 (BIA 1992), a Pennsylvania bad check conviction is not, because the statute requires only knowing issuance.
- Missouri Revised Statutes 570.120, passing bad checks, written in two alternatives of which only the first requires purpose to defraud.