DENVER — A federal judge has ordered immigration officials to immediately release a retired Ugandan priest who has been held in an Aurora detention center for more than a year, the Associated Press reported.
Source: Associated Press
The Rev. Edward Nalwamba, a retired Anglican priest in his late 70s, was scheduled to be released before the end of the day on Tuesday under an order issued Monday by U.S. Magistrate Judge Cyrus Y. Chung of the U.S. District Court of Colorado, which granted his petition for a writ of habeas corpus.
Source: Associated Press
Chung found that federal officials had not provided any certainty that they could remove him to his East African home country, from which he fled more than two decades ago. “Today, there is still no removal. There is not even a concrete plan for one,” the judge wrote, adding that officials had offered only a declaration that ICE was “working on scheduling” a charter flight it had previously described as imminent. “That will not do,” he wrote.
Source: JKN / Denver reporting
Nalwamba's detention at the Aurora ICE Processing Center, operated by the private contractor GEO Group, ended on Tuesday, October 20. According to accounts of his release, facility personnel would not allow him to use a wheelchair past the perimeter gate to reach a waiting vehicle, and two men who were released alongside him carried him outside to a friend's vehicle.
Source: JKN / Denver reporting
“They get me outside and say we can't go beyond this. And I'm asking, 'Can't the car come here?' They say, 'No.' I say, 'So how am I going to get the car?' Those friends offered to carry me, and, I mean, I'm so grateful to them,” Nalwamba said following his release.
Source: JKN / Denver reporting
Nalwamba came to the United States in 2002 for a religious conference and remained after publicly opposing the government in Uganda and facing targeted persecution, according to reporting on his case. He was arrested in 2010 and released under an order of supervision, attended regular immigration check-ins for years, and was detained again in September 2025, beginning the 13-month detention that the court has now ended.
Source: JKN / Denver reporting
Supporters, including U.S. Senator John Hickenlooper, had earlier pressed officials to pause Nalwamba's deportation and raised questions about his medical care in detention, according to a statement from the senator's office.
The court's order addresses the lawfulness of his continued detention; it does not by itself grant him permanent immigration status. His release returns him to the supervision arrangement he was under before his September 2025 arrest, according to reports.