Civil Rights and Federal Liability

Neiyerver Adrián Leon Rengel, a 28‑year‑old Venezuelan man deported by the Trump administration and held for about four months in El Salvador’s CECOT mega‑prison, has filed a first‑of‑its‑kind lawsuit in federal court in Washington, D.C., seeking at least $1.3 million in damages from the U.S. government. The complaint, brought under the Federal Tort Claims Act with backing from the League of United Latin American Citizens and the Democracy Defenders Fund, accuses U.S. authorities of false imprisonment and intentional infliction of emotional distress tied to his summary removal under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, despite an active immigration case and no deportation order. Leon Rengel, who entered the U.S. legally via the CBP One program and has only a misdemeanor drug‑paraphernalia conviction, alleges he was beaten, denied medical care, held in overcrowded, incommunicado conditions and driven to suicidal thoughts in CECOT, treatment that Human Rights Watch has described for this cohort as arbitrary detention and torture under international law. His case is the first known damages suit by any of the several hundred Venezuelan men whom the U.S. flew to El Salvador in 2025 after branding them Tren de Aragua gang members, a label CBS and 60 Minutes reporting has already shown frequently lacked any supporting criminal record. The outcome could determine whether the U.S. can be held financially liable when aggressive immigration enforcement and wartime authorities expose migrants to torture in foreign facilities, and it adds a new legal front to ongoing litigation over the legality of the administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act for mass deportations.