Cite as: 507 U. S. 292 (1993)
Stevens, J., dissenting
raised on the Government's [broad] view of the statute," we held that the statute merely authorized inquiries calculated to determine the continued availability for departure of aliens whose deportation was overdue. Id., at 201-202.
The majority holds that it was within the Attorney General's authority to determine that parents, guardians, and certain relatives are "presumptively appropriate custodians" for the juveniles that come into the INS' custody, ante, at 310, and therefore to detain indefinitely those juveniles who are without one of the "approved" custodians.22 In my view,
however, the guiding principles articulated in Carlson, NCIR, and Witkovich compel the opposite conclusion.
Congress has spoken quite clearly on the question of the plight of juveniles that come into federal custody. As explained above, § 504 of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974 demonstrates Congress' clear preference for release, as opposed to detention. See S. Rep. No.
22 While the regulation provides that release can be granted to a broader class of custodians in "unusual and compelling circumstances," the practice in the Western Region after the 1984 order, but before the issuance of the injunction, was to exercise that discretion only in the event of medical emergency. See Federal Defendants' Responses to Plaintiffs' Second Set of Interrogatories (CD Cal., Jan. 30, 1986), pp. 11-12. At oral argument, counsel for petitioners suggested that "extraordinary and compelling circumstances" might include the situation where a godfather has lived and cared for the child, has a kind of family relationship with the child, and is in the process of navigating the state bureaucracy in order to be appointed a guardian under state law. Tr. of Oral Arg. 54. Regardless of the precise contours of the exception to the INS' sweeping ban on discretion, it seems fair to conclude that it is meant to be extremely narrow.
There is nothing at all "puzzling," ante, at 312, n. 7, in respondents' objection to the INS' requirement that would-be custodians apply for and become guardians in order to assume temporary care of the juveniles in INS custody. Formal state guardianship proceedings, regardless of how appropriate they may be for determinations relating to permanent custody, would unnecessarily prolong the detention of these children. What is puzzling is that the Court acknowledges, see ibid., but then ignores the fact that were these children in state custody, they would be released to "other responsible adults" as a matter of course. See n. 7, supra.
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