"the nearly blind man was found dead on Tuesday evening, five days after US Border Patrol agents who had picked him up from the jail dropped him off at a coffee shop. They neglected to inform his lawyer or family where he was, making it impossible for Shah Alam to find his way home in sub-freezing temperatures."
"Shah Alam, who was blind in one eye and had partial, blurry vision in the other, had gotten lost one day in February 2025 and ended up on a woman's porch with a curtain rod he used as a walking stick. The woman called the police, who ordered Shah Alam to drop his "weapon" - the walking stick - and then Tasered, beat, and arrested him."
"His family, which includes a wife and two sons, chose not to bail him out of the county jail. His arrest had come a month into President Donald Trump's second term, and they feared US Immigration and Customs Enforcement would detain him if he was released and send him to a detention center out of state."
Nurul Amin Shah Alam, a 56-year-old Rohingya refugee from Myanmar, was found dead in Buffalo, New York, five days after Border Patrol agents released him from county jail without informing his lawyer or family of his whereabouts. Shah Alam, who was nearly blind with only partial vision in one eye, had been arrested in February 2025 after police mistook his walking stick for a weapon and Tasered and beat him. He was charged with assault, trespassing, and weapon possession. His family had kept him in jail rather than bail him out, fearing Immigration and Customs Enforcement would detain him during Trump's second term. Released without proper support or notification, Shah Alam became lost in sub-freezing temperatures and died.
#immigration-enforcement #refugee-rights #border-patrol-accountability #disability-and-law-enforcement #immigration-detention
Read at Truthout
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]