Newark Mayor Slams Prosecutors' ‘Breathtaking' Claims Over His False Arrest Lawsuit

By Nikita Biryukov, New Jersey Monitor

October 23, 2025

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka this week urged a federal court to allow his false arrest and malicious prosecution lawsuit to continue in response to federal prosecutors’ arguments that federal doctrine shields acting U.S. Attorney Alina Habba from the suit.

Prosecutors’ claims that Habba and a Department of Homeland Security investigator also named in the suit are entitled to qualified and absolute immunity is “breathtaking in its presumption that these actions can escape any accountability by the third branch of government,” Yael Bromberg, Baraka’s attorney, wrote to the judge overseeing the case on Tuesday.

“The Defendants are liable for violating constitutional rights,” Bromberg’s letter reads.

New videos capture tense moments surrounding arrest of Newark mayor

Baraka, a Democrat, in June sued Habba and Ricky Patel, the investigator, alleging they violated his constitutional rights after arresting him for trespassing at a Newark immigrant detention facility on May 9, only to drop the charge less than two weeks later, earning admonishment from the federal judge overseeing his case. Baraka said he was at the jail to inspect it with city officials.

Baraka’s attorneys argue the charges were dropped because federal authorities were aware the mayor committed no crime. Patel is seen on police body camera footage taken just prior to Baraka’s arrest saying that he was detaining the mayor “per the deputy attorney general of the United States.”

“Claims of malicious prosecution must show that the proceedings were initiated ‘without probable cause’ and that the defendants ‘acted maliciously for a purpose other than bringing the plaintiff to justice,’” Bromberg wrote, citing a 2017 appeals court decision. “Those circumstances are immediately present here.”

The police body camera footage, released as part of a separate federal case against Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-10), shows a staffer from Geo Group, the migrant jail’s operator, allowing Baraka into a fenced area of the facility, where he remained for roughly 40 minutes before new agents requested he exit the premises, whereupon he left.

McIver, who was later charged with assaulting officers during Baraka’s arrest, has said the case against her is purely political. Habba announced the charges against McIver at the same time she said she was dropping the case against Baraka.

Attorneys for Habba and Patel in a September letter signaled they would ask the judge to dismiss Baraka’s lawsuit, arguing he had failed to exhaust administrative remedies through complaints to the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security and should have filed a claim under the Federal Tort Claim Act.

Baraka’s suit does not cite that law. His claims of defamation and false light are state torts that his attorneys argue are controlled by state law, not federal. Habba in television appearances and on social media claimed Baraka stormed the facility alongside a mob of protestors (surveillance video footage shows protestors remained outside the facility’s gates).

Attorneys for Habba and Patel also argued they are protected from civil liability by the doctrines of qualified and absolute immunity, which shield officials from civil liabilities in such cases, and said the United States, which enjoys broader civil immunity under federal law, should replace Habba and Patel as Baraka’s defendant.

Habba’s tenure as U.S. attorney has been turbulent. A federal judge in August ruled she no longer has any legal authority because her temporary appointment ended in July, while the Trump administration argues that it made a series of personnel moves that will keep her in the job for roughly another six months. That case is expected to go before the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday.

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