Institution Hearing Program

By Elizabeth Franklin-Best, Esq., and Christopher Zoukis, JD, MBA

Program Statement	5111.04, CN-1
Subject	Institution Hearing Program
Current edition	04-14-1999 per BOP’s live policy index. The Change Notice document itself is dated May 23, 2017 and says it amends a base Program Statement “dated July 3, 2006” — three different dates, discussed below.
Change notices	CN-1 (the only edition BOP publishes). Deleted text is struck through and inserted text printed in green in the original PDF; neither marking survives text extraction.
Supersedes	PS 5111.01, Institution Hearing Program (IHP) (4/25/1997)
Governing statute	8 U.S.C. § 1228 (expedited removal of aliens convicted of aggravated felonies)
Governing regulation	8 C.F.R. part 238 (DHS) and its EOIR counterpart at 8 C.F.R. part 1238. No 28 C.F.R. provision governs the IHP.
Related BP forms	None. The Program Statement works through SENTRY entries and two internal designation forms it calls the PPG0 (Inmate Load and Security Designation) and PP10 (CMC Clearance and Separatee Data).
Official PDF	https://www.bop.gov/policy/progstat/5111.04_cn1.pdf

Checked against the BOP policy set · 2026-09-07 · How we verify

The Institution Hearing Program is the arrangement that lets immigration removal proceedings happen inside a federal prison, while the sentence is still being served, so that Immigration and Customs Enforcement can take custody the day the sentence ends instead of moving the person to a detention center first. It is run jointly by the Bureau of Prisons, ICE, and the Executive Office for Immigration Review. If your loved one has been moved for this program, the movement itself is explained at the federal inmate transfer process; the immigration consequences of a federal conviction are a separate and often more urgent subject — see Padilla and immigration consequences.

A warning about this document, stated up front because it changes what you can trust. PS 5111.04 is published only as a Change Notice with edits marked in strikethrough and green. Strikethrough does not survive when a PDF is converted to text — so roughly a page and a half of deleted policy still reads as live text in most copies circulating online, including several rules about detainers, hearing attendance and facility lists that the Bureau removed in 2017. Everything on this page was checked against the rendered original PDF, page by page, and the deletions are identified below.

The rule itself: the Institution Hearing Program

The Bureau tracks a person’s position in the Institution Hearing Program through a Case Management Activity assignment — a short code entered in SENTRY that appears on progress reports and unit-team paperwork. Five codes are active. This is the artifact to read if you are trying to work out what a piece of prison paperwork is telling you.

ACTIVE CMA ASSIGNMENTS

(a) IHP PART- IHP – Participant. Indicates the inmate is at a hearing site, is participating in the IHP, and should not be transferred until the hearing is completed. Only inmates at hearing sites will have this assignment. A list of IHP hearing sites is available on the Correctional Programs Sallyport page.

(b) IHP PEND – IHP – Pending Hearing Site. Indicates any inmate who requires an IHP hearing, but is not at a hearing site.

(c) NO IHP HRG – IHP – No Hearing Required. Indicates an inmate does not require an IHP hearing or placement at an IHP hearing site.

(d) IHP COMPLT – IHP – Hearing Complete. Indicates the IHP hearing has been completed.

(e) IHP INTRVW – IHP – ICE Interview Required. Indicates ICE needs to interview the inmate for possible placement at an IHP hearing site.

Reproduced from Program Statement 5111.04, CN-1 at p. 12, from the rendered original PDF. Struck-through text has been omitted, as the Bureau intended — see “What changed” below for exactly what was removed from each entry.

Four codes were deactivated by the 2017 change notice and may still appear on older or re-committed cases: NO IHP, IHP CMP WD, IHP CMPWDE, IHP CMPWDI and IHP CMP ND (PS 5111.04 at pp. 12–13). A “will deport” code from a previous sentence is significant — the Program Statement directs that where a person has an order of deportation from an earlier commitment, “the inmate does not have to have another hearing with EOIR,” but “that order must be reinstated, which requires ICE to conduct an interview with the inmate” (PS 5111.04 at p. 13).

How the code gets assigned

Attachment A maps what the designator writes on the designation form to the code that follows:

DSCC Remarks (PPG0)	CMA Assignment
“Per ICE, does not require hearing site”	NO IHP HRG
“Per ICE, US Citizen”	No CMA Assignment required
“Per ICE, requires interview with local field office”	IHP INTRVW
“Per ICE, requires hearing site”	IHP PEND (if not at hearing site) / IHP PART (if at hearing site)

Reproduced from Program Statement 5111.04, CN-1 at p. 17 (Attachment A).

Notice what the left-hand column says. Every entry begins “Per ICE.” The Bureau is recording a determination ICE made, not one it made itself. That is the structural fact that explains most of the frustration on this page: the Bureau is the venue and the record-keeper, and ICE is the decisionmaker.

The law behind the program — and what it actually promises

The Program Statement is agency policy. The law is 8 U.S.C. § 1228, and reading it is worth ten minutes because it says three things the Program Statement does not.

It requires the program to exist. Section 1228(a)(1) provides that “The Attorney General shall provide for the availability of special removal proceedings at certain Federal, State, and local correctional facilities” for people convicted of specified offenses, conducted “in a manner which assures expeditious removal following the end of the alien’s incarceration for the underlying sentence.” Section 1228(a)(3)(A) adds that the Attorney General “shall provide for the initiation and, to the extent possible, the completion of removal proceedings, and any administrative appeals thereof . . . before the alien’s release from incarceration.”

It creates no right you can enforce. The same paragraph closes with this sentence:

“Nothing in this section shall be construed to create any substantive or procedural right or benefit that is legally enforceable by any party against the United States or its agencies or officers or any other person.”

Quoted from 8 U.S.C. § 1228(a)(1).

That is the most important sentence on this page for anyone thinking about filing something. Congress told the Attorney General to run the program and then said in terms that the instruction is not enforceable by the people it affects. A Program Statement is agency policy rather than law to begin with; here even the statute behind it disclaims enforceable rights.

And it does not require removal before release. Section 1228(a)(3)(B): “Nothing in this section shall be construed as requiring the Attorney General to effect the removal of any alien sentenced to actual incarceration, before release from the penitentiary or correctional institution where such alien is confined.” Getting a hearing during the sentence is the goal; it is not assured, and no one should be told otherwise.

The two tracks, and why one is much faster

Not everyone in the Institution Hearing Program sees an immigration judge. There are two routes, and which one applies changes everything about the timeline.

Administrative removal under 8 U.S.C. § 1228(b) and 8 C.F.R. § 238.1 applies to a person who was not lawfully admitted for permanent residence (or held conditional permanent resident status) and has a final conviction for an aggravated felony. There is no hearing before a judge at all — an immigration officer issues a charging document and, later, a final order. The Program Statement describes these people at p. 4 as those “Convicted of an aggravated felony, and Not lawful permanent residents, and Not eligible for any relief from deportation.”

Proceedings before an immigration judge under 8 U.S.C. § 1229a — the ordinary removal hearing — apply to everyone else in the program. These are the EOIR hearings the Program Statement’s hearing-site machinery is built around.

The administrative track runs on short, hard deadlines that appear nowhere in the Program Statement. They are the most useful facts on this page for anyone actually inside it:

Stage	Time allowed	Source
Respond to the Form I-851 Notice of Intent	10 calendar days from personal service (13 if served by mail)	8 C.F.R. § 238.1(c)(1)
Final response after the Government serves its evidence, if you asked to review it	10 calendar days from service of the evidence (13 if by mail)	8 C.F.R. § 238.1(c)(2)
Response to any additional evidence the deciding officer obtains	10 calendar days from service (13 if by mail)	8 C.F.R. § 238.1
Between the Final Administrative Removal Order and execution of the Warrant of Removal	no sooner than 14 calendar days, unless knowingly, voluntarily and in writing waived	8 C.F.R. § 238.1(f); 8 U.S.C. § 1228(b)(3)

The statute explains what that last window is for: the Attorney General “may not execute any order described in paragraph (1) until 14 calendar days have passed from the date that such order was issued, unless waived by the alien, in order that the alien has an opportunity to apply for judicial review under section 1252.” Waiving it waives the practical chance to seek review.

Ten days is not long for anyone. It is very short for someone in a federal prison with no internet access, limited phone time and mail that takes days each way.

What the statute requires procedurally

Where the Program Statement is silent, § 1228(b)(4) is specific. In administrative removal proceedings the Attorney General shall provide that:

“(A) the alien is given reasonable notice of the charges and of the opportunity described in subparagraph (C);

(B) the alien shall have the privilege of being represented (at no expense to the government) by such counsel, authorized to practice in such proceedings, as the alien shall choose;

(C) the alien has a reasonable opportunity to inspect the evidence and rebut the charges;

(D) a determination is made for the record that the individual upon whom the notice for the proceeding under this section is served (either in person or by mail) is, in fact, the alien named in such notice;

(E) a record is maintained for judicial review; and

(F) the final order of removal is not adjudicated by the same person who issues the charges.”

Quoted from 8 U.S.C. § 1228(b)(4).

The regulation adds two more concrete entitlements. 8 C.F.R. § 238.1 requires that “The Service shall provide the alien with a list of available free legal services programs” and that “The Service must either provide the alien with a written translation of the Notice of Intent or explain the contents of the Notice of Intent to the alien in the alien’s native language or in a language that the alien understands.”

Read subparagraph (B) carefully. There is a right to counsel “at no expense to the government.” No lawyer will be appointed. Anyone facing an Institution Hearing Program proceeding who wants representation has to arrange it, and the ten-day clock is running while they try.

One further limit, stated bluntly by the statute at § 1228(b)(5): “No alien described in this section shall be eligible for any relief from removal that the Attorney General may grant in the Attorney General’s discretion.”

Applied Insight — Christopher Zoukis, JD, MBA, Managing Director: The first thing worth establishing in an Institution Hearing Program file is which track the person is on, because the two look nothing alike from inside. If a Form I-851 Notice of Intent has been served, that is the administrative track, the clock is ten days, and there will be no judge. If the paperwork is a notice to appear before EOIR, there is a hearing and a different set of rules. The second thing we look for is the date and manner of service on the I-851, because the deadline runs from it and the three extra days for mail service are frequently the difference between a timely response and none.

The removal order and the criminal case are connected

There is one provision worth knowing about for anyone with a direct appeal or post-conviction motion pending. Under the judicial-removal provisions of § 1228, where a district judge enters an order of removal at sentencing, the statute provides:

“Upon execution by the defendant of a valid waiver of the right to appeal the conviction on which the order of removal is based, the expiration of the period described in section 1252(b)(1) of this title, or the final dismissal of an appeal from such conviction, the order of removal shall become final and shall be executed at the end of the prison term in accordance with the terms of the order. If the conviction is reversed on direct appeal, the order entered pursuant to this section shall be void.”

Quoted from 8 U.S.C. § 1228, judicial removal provisions, paragraph (3)(A)(iii).

Two things follow. A judicial removal order becomes final when the criminal appeal ends — so the criminal appeal and the removal order are not independent of each other. And a reversal on direct appeal voids that order outright.

This applies to judicially ordered removal — an order entered by a district judge at sentencing at the request of the U.S. Attorney — not to every removal order. The same section also permits a stipulated judicial order of removal as a term of a plea agreement under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11. If a plea agreement in your case contained such a stipulation, that is a fact your appellate or post-conviction counsel needs to know about early, not late. The Program Statement records at p. 4 that “A condition of supervision requiring the offender to report to ICE for voluntary deportation does not constitute a judicial deportation order” — a distinction worth checking against your own judgment.

Where you are held, and when you are moved

The Program Statement’s designation rules turn on how much time is left to serve.

At initial designation (PS 5111.04 at p. 7): for people “Serving Sentences of 60 Months or Less,” “A hearing site will be designated as bedspace permits. If a hearing site is not designated, the reasons will be documented on the PPG0 (e.g., NEEDS IHP, NO BEDSPACE AVAILABLE AT IHP SITE).” For people “Serving Sentences of More than 60 Months,” “Ordinarily, an institution will be designated according to standard procedures. A re-designation request should be initiated within 48-60 months of the Projected Release Date.”

Re-designation (PS 5111.04 at p. 7): “Normally, a referral for transfer to a hearing site will be submitted when an inmate has between 48–60 months remaining to serve. If the Designator is still unable to re-designate a hearing site for the inmate, justification will be entered on the CMC Clearance and Separatee Data form (PP10) and retained in the Inmate Central File.”

After the hearing (PS 5111.04 at pp. 8–9), and here the 2017 amendments matter — the current thresholds are 18 months, not the 12 months that appears in unmarked text extractions:

Outcome	Time to Projected Release Date	What the policy directs
Not ordered removed	18 months or less	“Inmates will normally remain at the hearing site for release processing (e.g., to a Residential Reentry Center [RRC]).”
Not ordered removed	More than 18 months	“Inmates will be referred for re-designation to any appropriate institution commensurate with security and programming needs.”
Ordered removed	18 months or less	“Inmates should remain at the hearing site, where they will normally remain for release processing.”
Ordered removed	More than 18 months	“Inmates should be referred for re-designation to a facility commensurate with their security and programming needs.”

Reproduced from Program Statement 5111.04, CN-1 at pp. 8–9, from the rendered original PDF with deletions omitted and 2017 insertions applied. The superseded figures were “12 months” and “Expiration of Sentence”; the current text reads “18 months” and “Projected Release Date.”

Medical cases are handled separately: people “requiring medical and/or psychiatric care shall be submitted for designation or re-designation,” with the referral to the medical designator indicating the person’s IHP status, and after treatment “the inmate should be referred for placement at a hearing site” (PS 5111.04 at p. 9). See medical designations and care levels.

The 30-day ICE interview rule

The one deadline the Bureau imposes on itself is worth knowing:

“Unit staff will provide notification to the ICE designated Point of Contact (POC) regarding inmates arriving at the institution with a CMA assignment of ‘IHP INTRVW.’ This notice shall identify the inmate(s) requiring an interview within 30 days (from the date of notification) and request a final disposition regarding IHP eligibility be provided. If a response is not received within 30 days, staff will notify the Administrator, Correctional Programs Branch, by forwarding an electronic copy of the dated notice referred to ICE.”

Reproduced from Program Statement 5111.04, CN-1 at p. 11.

This is a genuinely useful provision for someone stuck at IHP INTRVW for months. It gives a named escalation — the Administrator of the Correctional Programs Branch — and a documented trigger. It is also a staff instruction, not a right, and the Bureau cannot make ICE answer.

Appeals

“Ordinarily, appeals of deportation/removal decisions do not require in-person hearings. EOIR provides appeal forms. Inmates at non-hearing sites should be advised to request appeal forms from:

Board of Immigration Appeals Office of the Chief Clerk 5107 Leesburg Pike, Suite 2000 Falls Church, VA 22041

If an order is overturned on appeal, coordinate with your designated ICE POC regarding the lifting of ICE detainers, should any be present. The CMA assignment will be updated to reflect the new decision.”

Reproduced from Program Statement 5111.04, CN-1 at p. 11. This address is what the Bureau printed in 2017; confirm it with EOIR before relying on it for a filing, since agency addresses and filing methods change.

Note what the current text says about detainers, and what it no longer says. It directs staff to “coordinate with your designated ICE POC regarding the lifting of ICE detainers.” The 2017 change notice deleted the older sentence stating that the local ICE office “will remove the detainer and notify the institution.” Coordination is not removal. No one — not this page, not the Bureau, not a consultant — can tell you that a detainer will be lifted. Only ICE lifts an ICE detainer, and the current policy says so obliquely by describing coordination rather than outcome.

The same shift appears where a person is not ordered removed. The current text reads: “When removal is not ordered at the conclusion of the administrative proceeding, a written copy of the final order should be placed in the J&C and Inmate Central Files. The lifting of an ICE detainer requires a written notification provided by ICE” (PS 5111.04 at p. 8). Written notification from ICE is the operative event.

What the Institution Hearing Program means for you

If you are the person inside: which track and which CMA code

Find out which track you are on and what your CMA code says. Ask your unit team for your CMA assignment through an Inmate Request to Staff — the five active codes above tell you whether ICE has decided you need a hearing, needs to interview you first, or has determined you need nothing.

If you have been served with a Form I-851 Notice of Intent to Issue a Final Administrative Deportation Order, treat it as the most time-sensitive document you have. Ten calendar days from personal service, thirteen if it came by mail. You may rebut the allegations, ask to review the government’s evidence, designate a country, state an intention to seek withholding of removal, or ask in writing for an extension “stating the specific reasons why such an extension is necessary.” Doing none of those things is a decision with permanent consequences.

Two entitlements are worth asking for by name, because they are in the regulation: the list of free legal services programs the agency is required to provide, and a written translation or an explanation in a language you understand if the notice is not in your language.

Understand the limits honestly. You have a right to counsel at no expense to the government, which means you must find and pay for one. There is no appointed immigration lawyer. And neither the statute nor this Program Statement gives you an enforceable right to a hearing before your release date.

If you are the family: two time-sensitive steps

The two things you can most usefully do are both time-sensitive, and both are outside the prison.

Find immigration counsel now, not later. The ten-day and fourteen-day windows in the table above are real, and there is no appointed lawyer. If your family member is on the administrative track, most of the case may be over before a first visit is scheduled. The agency is required to give them a list of free legal services programs; you can look for the same organizations from outside, faster.

Gather the immigration history. Lawful permanent resident status is the single fact that most changes the picture, because the fast administrative track under § 1228(b) reaches people who were “not lawfully admitted for permanent residence.” Green cards, naturalization papers, prior immigration filings, and any earlier removal order all matter. If there was a prior deportation, note that the Program Statement says an order from a previous sentence does not require a new EOIR hearing but must be reinstated, which requires an ICE interview.

Expect movement. Hearing sites and release sites are specific institutions, so a transfer is part of the design rather than a sign of trouble. And be prepared for the person to be released to ICE rather than to you at the end of the sentence — that is the entire purpose of the program, and it is worth planning for rather than being surprised by.

If you are counsel: the Institution Hearing Program

The criminal case and the immigration case are entangled, and the entanglement runs in both directions.

If a judicial order of removal was entered at sentencing, § 1228’s judicial-removal provisions make it final on the conclusion of the direct appeal and void if the conviction is reversed on direct appeal. That is a concrete stake in an appeal that a client may not have understood. Check the judgment and the plea agreement for a stipulated removal order under Rule 11.

Note that the statute reaches convictions “covered in section 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii), (B), (C), or (D)” — not aggravated felonies alone. And § 1228(c)’s presumption provision states that “An alien convicted of an aggravated felony shall be conclusively presumed to be deportable from the United States,” which puts the aggravated-felony characterisation of the conviction at the center of the case. Where the characterisation is contestable, it is contestable in the criminal case as well as the immigration one — see Padilla and immigration consequences.

On the administrative track, § 1228(b)(4)(F) supplies a structural requirement worth checking on the face of the paperwork: “the final order of removal is not adjudicated by the same person who issues the charges.” And § 1228(b)(3)’s fourteen-day window exists expressly “in order that the alien has an opportunity to apply for judicial review under section 1252,” so a waiver of that period has consequences beyond speed.

Finally, be careful with any secondary source describing this Program Statement. Because the published document is a change notice with strikethrough that does not survive extraction, descriptions of BOP IHP policy in circulation routinely state deleted rules as current — including that IHP hearings are public and open to family, that detainers are removed when deportation is not ordered, and that detainers and state sentences do not affect IHP participation. All three of those sentences were struck in 2017. The section below identifies them.

What changed in the 2017 IHP change notice

The 2017 change notice rescinded PS 5111.01 (4/25/1997) and made substantial deletions. Because the deletions do not survive text extraction, they are the single most valuable thing this page can tell you. Each item below was confirmed against the rendered original PDF.

Hearings are no longer described as public. The struck text read: “IHP hearings are considered public. An inmate’s family members, friends, the media, and the public are eligible to attend.” The replacement text, in full, reads: “A representative is eligible to attend an IHP hearing” (PS 5111.04 at p. 7). The heading changed from “Public Hearings” to “Representatives.” Also struck was the surrounding instruction that “Wardens at hearing sites are to work closely with ICE and EOIR to allow public access to the hearings”; what survives is “The Warden will make the final decision regarding entrance of visitors” (PS 5111.04 at p. 8). Any source telling a family they may attend an IHP hearing is quoting deleted text. Visitor access runs through visiting regulations and the warden’s decision.

The detainer rules were rewritten. Struck: “If deportation is not ordered, ICE will remove its detainer and provide written documentation to institution staff.” Surviving: “The lifting of an ICE detainer requires a written notification provided by ICE” (PS 5111.04 at p. 8). Also struck, in the appeals section: “If the decision is overturned on appeal, the local ICE office will remove the detainer and notify the institution,” replaced with an instruction to “coordinate with your designated ICE POC regarding the lifting of ICE detainers” (PS 5111.04 at p. 11). The Bureau moved from describing an outcome to describing a process.

An entire section was deleted. Section 12, “OTHER CONSIDERATIONS,” is struck in its entirety — heading and all — together with everything under it. That includes the frequently quoted sentence “Detainers and/or state sentences (concurrent or consecutive) do not affect IHP participation” (PS 5111.04 at p. 9), the whole of the 60-month designation scheme for people with existing deportation orders, and the geographic-proximity rule directing that “Eastern Canadian and European citizens should be housed in the Northeast Region; Mexican and Central and South American citizens should be housed in the South Central or Western Region” (PS 5111.04 at p. 10). Page 10 of the document is struck from top to bottom. None of it is current policy.

The facility list was deleted. The two-page “IHP SITES” attachment listing every hearing and release site is struck in full (PS 5111.04 at pp. 15–16). It was replaced by a pointer: “A list of IHP hearing sites is available on the Correctional Programs Sallyport page” — an internal staff system the public cannot reach. That deletion has aged well: the struck list names FCI Dublin and Taft Correctional Institution, both of which have since come off the Bureau’s roster, so republishing it would be wrong twice over. This page does not reproduce it.

Three more sections were deleted outright: “Program Participation,” which had said inmates at hearing and release sites “will not be considered for transfer for program participation or for nearer release purposes”; “Transfer to ICE Custody for the Hearing Process”; and “Hearing Room,” which had required the warden to make a room or video equipment available (PS 5111.04 at pp. 7, 9). Also struck: “ICE will process inmates who were not re-designated to a hearing site at sentence expiration” (PS 5111.04 at p. 7).

Numeric thresholds moved from 12 months to 18 months, and the measuring point moved from Expiration of Sentence to Projected Release Date — in four separate headings across pp. 8–9. Because strikethrough is invisible in extracted text, those headings read as “12 18 Months . . . Expiration of Sentence Projected Release Date,” which is why the wrong figure circulates.

Terminology was modernized. “Deportation” became “deportation/removal” throughout; the Immigration and Naturalization Service became ICE; Community Corrections Centers became Residential Reentry Centers; Inmate Systems Management became Correctional Systems; and, per the Bureau’s own summary at p. 2, “All references to stipulated deportation procedures have been removed” and “All references to IHP unit assignments have been removed.”

PS 5111.04 was not among the twenty-three Program Statements the Bureau reissued effective 22 June 2026, and nothing for it appears in the superseded set. It remains in force in the form described here.

Where people get stuck waiting at IHP INTRVW

“He has been sitting at IHP INTRVW for months.” The Program Statement gives staff a route: notification to the ICE point of contact identifying the person as requiring an interview within 30 days, and if no response comes within 30 days, notification to the Administrator of the Correctional Programs Branch with a copy of the dated notice (PS 5111.04 at p. 11). Ask the unit team, through an Inmate Request to Staff, whether that notification was sent and whether the escalation was made. If the answer is no or there is no answer, the Administrative Remedy Program sequence — informal resolution, then BP-9, BP-10 to the region, BP-11 to the Office of National Inmate Appeals — will at least create a record. It will not make ICE act, and no filing against the Bureau can.

“We were told the family could attend the hearing and then we were turned away.” That instruction was deleted in 2017. The current text says only that “A representative is eligible to attend an IHP hearing,” and that “The Warden will make the final decision regarding entrance of visitors.” A source saying otherwise is quoting struck text.

“The judge did not order him deported, so why is there still a detainer?” Because lifting a detainer is ICE’s act, not the Bureau’s, and the current policy says “The lifting of an ICE detainer requires a written notification provided by ICE.” The older sentence promising that ICE “will remove its detainer” was deleted. The practical step is to obtain the written decision and get it into the Judgment and Commitment and Inmate Central Files, which the policy directs, and then pursue the detainer with ICE. General detainer mechanics are covered at detainers and the Interstate Agreement on Detainers, though the Interstate Agreement on Detainers itself does not govern immigration detainers.

“He signed something and now there is a final order.” If it was a waiver of the 14-day period, the consequence is specific: § 1228(b)(3) sets that window expressly so the person “has an opportunity to apply for judicial review under section 1252.” A waiver has to be “knowingly, voluntarily, and in writing” under 8 C.F.R. § 238.1. Whether those conditions were met is a question for immigration counsel, quickly.

“He is a U.S. citizen and they still put an immigration hold on him.” Attachment A shows what should happen: a DSCC remark of “Per ICE, US Citizen” produces “No CMA Assignment required.” If a citizen has a CMA assignment or an ICE detainer, that is a factual error in the record, and it should be raised in writing with documentation — a passport, certificate of naturalization, or birth certificate — through the unit team and Correctional Systems, and escalated through the administrative remedy sequence. It is also worth immigration counsel’s attention independently.

“He never got a hearing before his release date.” That is disappointing but not unlawful. 8 U.S.C. § 1228(a)(3)(B) says nothing in the section requires removal to be effected before release, and § 1228(a)(1) says the section creates no enforceable right. Section 1228(a)(3)(A) requires completion of proceedings before release only “to the extent possible.”

Related BOP policy on immigration hearings in custody

• Transfer to state custody before release (PS 5140.44) and state writs and transfers (PS 5875.13) — the other two ways a federal sentence ends with someone in another authority’s hands.
• Civil contempt commitments (PS 5140.41) — the fourth member of the custody-handoff group.
• International prisoner transfer and the transfer treaty program — treaty transfer, which is a voluntary application to serve a sentence in the home country, and is not removal.
• Security designation and custody classification — where the Alien Public Safety Factor sits. The Program Statement directs case managers to “Review an inmate’s custody classification for removal of the Alien Public Safety Factor and possible custody reduction following a decision not to deport” (PS 5111.04 at p. 6).
• Central Inmate Monitoring System (PS 5180.05) — named in this Program Statement for escorting people with CIM assignments to hearing rooms.
• Medical designations and care levels — the medical-designation route the Program Statement carves out.
• Visiting regulations — named in this Program Statement for visitor entrance decisions at hearings.
• Halfway house placement procedures — the release processing the post-hearing rules refer to for people not ordered removed.
• Padilla and immigration consequences of a conviction — the post-conviction side.
• The federal inmate transfer process — the plain-language companion on movement between institutions.

Frequently Asked Questions About the Institution Hearing Program

Reviewed for legal accuracy by Elizabeth Franklin-Best, Esq., Principal Attorney·September 2026