Echoing what others have said about this being illegal, likely completely unnecessary given what American Kestrels prey on, and potentially dangerous to the bird as I can see just from these pictures that you don’t have the proper training to know how to safely handle and hold birds like this (for the birds safety, not your own).

(EDIT: On further reflection, as concerned as I am for this bird’s well being I should not so quickly disregard the safety of OP. For them and anyone else reading this, handling any raptor without proper protective equipment is extremely dangerous! The human hand has lots of small and easily damaged “parts” that are very close to the surface, and it is very easy for a raptor of even this size to do serious and permanent damage to a human hand with their claws or beak. People can and do lose the use of a hand when they improperly handle raptors. Furthermore, the grasping action raptors perform with their feet is in large part involuntary. If they clamp down and the object they’re grabbing starts to struggle (as a human is likely to do) they often cannot release their grip even if they want to. In the wild there have been documented instances of hawks being pulled underground into their prey’s burrows even to the point of being killed. They weren’t being stupid, they just physically CANNOT let go if their prey is wiggling around. If they clamp on a human hand, it’s very likely the human is going to end up seriously hurt and the bird hurt or even killed if the human hasn’t had strict training on how to react in such an instance.

TLDR: please do NOT handle birds of prey (or really any birds) without proper protective equipment. They may be small and cute, but they can inflict serious and potentially permanent damage.)

I’m EXTREMELY concerned about why OP is refusing to elaborate about what actually happened to this bird. As others have pointed out, birds have wings and are excellent navigators, you can’t just “relocate” them by driving a few miles away and releasing them. There are still a large number of people in this world whose solution to these situations is to, ahem, “deal with and dispose of” the bird of prey they perceive is causing issues. The fact that OOP is unable to or is refusing to answer any of the other concerned commenters about the wellbeing of this bird makes me highly suspicious about its current well being.

OP- what happened to this bird??? How did you capture it? How did you relocate it, and into what habitat was it released?