Afghan refugee Tased by ICE in CT claims arrest was retaliatory. He's moved, wife can't find him

Yahoo

27-05-2025

A judge early Tuesday ordered the release on bond of an Afghan refugee living in New Haven who was arrested and taken into custody when Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents shot him seven times with Tasers inside the federal court building in Hartford, according to information presented in court.
However, Saifullah Khan's wife, a U.S. citizen, said he was still in custody Tuesday evening and and there were indications he may have been transferred to some other institution from the state jail in Plymouth, Mass. where he was being held earn when his family learned of the bond decision. At 6 p.m., she said she had been unable to learn where Khan was being held.
In a related matter, Saifullah Khan's lawyers argued in new papers filed in U.S. District Court that his arrest on May 9 was in retaliation for a suit he filed just weeks earlier that names top Trump administration security officials and demands that they be compelled to finally act on an asylum application he filed nine years ago.
Khan, who was arrested in Hartford, was being held for two weeks at Plymouth and his bond hearing took place in Chelmsford, Mass. According to online ICE records, he remains in the Plymouth facility.
U.S. Immigration Judge Donald Ostrom heard argument for and against bond during a hearing in Chelmsford last week and, at the time, said he would issue a written decision at a later date. On Tuesday, the U.S. immigration court in Massachusetts issued a two page form with a box checked next to 'released from custody under bond of $7,500.00.'
The Department of Justice can appeal the decision.
Khan, 32, was confronted by five ICE agents earlier this month after he and his wife walked to an elevator at the conclusion of an immigration hearing on the sixth floor of the federal building, according to information presented in court.
When the plain clothes agents did not identify themselves, Khan called out for the immigration judge and tried to re-enter the courtroom. Khan required medical attention for a possible concussion after being immobilized by the Taser fire and falling, according to the information presented in court.
Hartford immigration Judge Theodore Doolittle was rebuked for interfering by the ICE agents when he intervened in the commotion outside his courtroom, according to information presented at the bond hearing and other witnesses.
Khan, who was born in a Pakistani refugee camp after his family was forced by the Taliban to flee Afghanistan, entered the U.S. to study at Yale in 2012 and applied for asylum in 2016 when he lost his student visa.
In late March, after 9 years of what Khan's lawyers characterized as 'inaction on his asylum application,' he filed what is known as a mandamus action in an effort to compel U.S. immigration officials to settle the question. The suit names the five ICE agents who detained Khan, as well as five senior Trump administration figures, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
'Prior to filing this lawsuit, Plaintiff made numerous inquiries about the status of his applications through proper channels, including case inquiries and requests to expedite, all of which were either ignored or met with form responses indicating the cases remained under review,' Khan's lawyers wrote in a court filing.
Within weeks of naming Noem and the others in the suit, Khan received a notice that ICE had begun proceedings to deport him and he was ordered to appear at the hearing after which he was hit with the Tasers and taken into custody, according to the court filing.
The Justice Department opposed releasing Khan bond, arguing among other things that they had been unable to locate him for the seven years preceding his arrest on May 9. According to statements made in court, immigration officials had Khan's address and regularly mailed him notices, including the order to appear in court in Hartford on the day he was arrested.
Federal immigration officials have not responded to requests to discuss the case.
Khan has no criminal record, but was accused by a Yale classmate of sexually assaulting her after a date in 2015. He was acquitted of all charges after a trial in criminal court. When Yale expelled him in spite of the acquittal, he sued the school for defamation and related rights violations.
The state Supreme Court has ruled that the Yale internal disciplinary process that resulted in the expulsion was unfair and a federal appeals court has refused to dismiss the defamation suit.