The New Mexico Supreme Court on Friday ordered the immediate release of 29 people jailed overnight in three lockups in Santa Fe and Taos counties after a Taos judge held them in contempt of court.

Twenty-eight of the people jailed following a courtroom disturbance are members of Taos Pueblo.

The order, issued by Justices Patricia Serna, Richard Bosson and Charles Daniels, vacated the arrest order handed down by 8th Judicial District Judge Sam Sanchez on Thursday afternoon. The justices directed that those arrested be arraigned in Sanchez's court Monday.

The New Mexico Public Defender's Office, in an emergency petition to the high court, sought the release of all 29 on grounds that they were denied due process rights under the state and U.S. constitutions because they were not given "individual hearings or any proof of individual responsibility."

The petition argued that the disruption in Sanchez's court — which came during a hearing on whether to reduce a convicted rapist's sentence — was the fault of only three or four individuals and that Sanchez had used a "giant net scooping up and summarily jailing ten times that number."

While 32 people were listed as petitioners, the number jailed actually was 29, said David Eisenberg, chief deputy public defender for the state. He said several people may have been allowed to remain free because of medical conditions.

Eisenberg said seven were booked into the Taos town jail, four held at the Taos Pueblo jail, and 18 bused to the Santa Fe County jail, 75 miles away.

All were in the process of being freed early Friday night.

"The problem with the judge's order," Eisenberg said, "was that if you were in the (court) gallery, you get to spend the night in jail."

He said Taos County was sending a bus to retrieve those who had been held in the Santa Fe jail.

No estimate of the cost of the mass arrest was immediately available.

John Day is attorney for Jonathan Evans, 61, of Taos, the only nontribal member among the 29. Day said his client was simply a spectator in the court and had nothing to do with any disturbance.

Evans was a former employer of 31-year-old Dominic Bau, who pleaded guilty earlier this year to raping a young female relative in 2007.

Bau had asked Judge Sanchez to reconsider his 12-year sentence. The disturbance, which Taos County Undersheriff Ed Romero described as "pretty rowdy," erupted when Sanchez denied Bau's request.

Sheriff's deputies brought in cuffs and chains as those arrested were fingerprinted and their belongings packed.

The sheriff's report said that Sanchez told authorities he had attempted to silence spectators during the hearing several times. After he ruled against Bau, Sanchez said, members of the audience and Bau himself began yelling and shouting profanities. Witnesses also claimed that Bau's friends and family and the victim's family also exchanged words.

Bau's case file on the incident said that Bau was attending his grandmother's funeral with the rest of his family when he took the girl to a room at the Sun God Lodge. There, the victim told authorities, Bau raped the girl after giving her cigarettes and alcohol. The girl's system also tested positive for cocaine, though it was never proven that Bau gave her the drug.

Friday's Supreme Court order directing release of the petitioners and ordering them to appear before Sanchez for arraignment at 4 p.m. Monday also gave Sanchez until noon Monday to respond to the high court's order.

The Taos News contributed to this report.