United States

ICE Arrests Professor, Father of Three in US for 30 Years

Syed Ahmed Jamal, from Bangladesh, has a "long history" of trying to get a path to U.S. citizenship

A Kansas professor and father of three who has been living in the U.S. for 30 years was recently detained by immigration agents and now faces deportation, NBC News reported.

Syed Ahmed Jamal, from Bangladesh, was about to take his daughter to school on Jan. 24 when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials showed up on his front lawn and arrested him.

Jamal, 55, is a chemistry instructor who entered the U.S. lawfully on an international student visa in the 1980s, according to a lawyer for the family, Jeffrey Y. Bennett. He has three children — ages 7, 12, and 14 — all of whom are U.S. citizens, and he has no record, other than a couple of speeding tickets that have long been resolved, Bennett said.

Jamal has a "long history" of trying to get a path to U.S. citizenship, Bennett added. Throughout the years, he had a handful of student visas while pursuing graduate degrees in science and engineering, and then a H-1B visa for highly skilled workers; at the time of his detainment, he had overstayed a voluntary departure notice, but had been granted permission to stay in the U.S. under supervision. He had been given prosecutorial discretion to indefinitely stay in the U.S. under a policy formalized by President Barack Obama.

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