Ricardo M. Urbina, Trailblazing Latino Judge in Capital, Dies at 79

Ricardo M. Urbina, a trailblazing Latino lawyer who scored victories for civil liberties as an empathetic federal judge and for civil rights as a record-breaking track star — helping to fuel an epochal protest at the 1968 Olympics — died on Monday in Washington. He was 79.

His death, in an assisted living facility, was caused by complications of Parkinson’s disease, his son, Ian Urbina, said.

Judge Urbina, the first Latino appointed to the Superior Court of the District of Columbia and the United States District Court in Washington, figured most prominently in cases that originated with the federal government’s war against terrorism and that put him at odds with the administration of President George W. Bush.

In 2007, he extended habeas corpus rights to Shawqi Ahmad Omar, a citizen of Jordan and the United States who was about to be transferred to Iraqi custody to be tried as a terrorist.

In 2008, Judge Urbina ordered the release of a number of prisoners being held at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp in Cuba, including 17 from the Uyghur Muslim minority in western China. They had been imprisoned since 2002, but the judge ruled that they did not threaten the security of the United States.