Tufts student's immigration arrest case moved to Vermont, not Louisiana, by US judge

By Nate Raymond and Jack Queen

(Reuters) -The Trump administration on Friday lost a bid to throw out or move to Louisiana a Tufts University student's legal challenge to her immigration arrest, which sparked protests against the president's efforts to deport pro-Palestinian activists on American campuses.

U.S. District Judge Denise Casper said the case brought by Rumeysa Ozturk, 30, in Massachusetts should instead be heard in Vermont, where the Turkish citizen was initially moved into custody after her arrest was captured in a viral video, prompting demonstrations.

That arrest occurred on March 25 on a public street in the Boston suburb of Somerville and was carried out by masked, plainclothes immigration agents a year after she co-authored a pro-Palestinian opinion piece in a student newspaper.

The video helped turn the case into a high-profile example of Republican President Donald Trump's efforts to deport pro-Palestinian activists on U.S. campuses who have spoken out against Israel's war in Gaza. Her lawyers argued her detention is unlawful and a violation of her free speech rights.

Trump's administration had argued that any legal challenge over Ozturk's detention could only proceed in Louisiana, where the PhD student and Fulbright scholar was flown to be detained soon after her arrest.

Any appeals in Louisiana would have been heard by one of the most conservative appeals courts in the country, and her attorneys at the American Civil Liberties Union alleged she was secretly whisked away to engage in unusual "forum shopping."

Soon after her arrest a lawyer for Ozturk sued and secured a court order requiring her to not be removed from Massachusetts without 48 hours' notice.

Yet Casper in Friday's ruling said that unbeknownst to anyone but the government, she was already gone, with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement having taken her to Vermont, from where she was flown the next day to Louisiana.

The U.S. Justice Department said the transfer was simply because there were no beds available for female detainees in Massachusetts. It said given she was out of the state when the case was filed, the Massachusetts court lacked jurisdiction.

But Casper said "the sequence of events here was far from routine," as Ozturk's lawyer was never told where her client was and that women detained by ICE in Massachusetts are routinely housed in facilities in other New England states.

While Casper concluded the case could not proceed in Massachusetts, she sent it to Vermont. Lawyers for Ozturk called the decision an early victory in their fight to secure her release.

"We are ready to defend Ms. Ozturk’s rights in Vermont to bring her back to her loved ones and life in Somerville," said Jessie Rossman, a lawyer at the ACLU of Massachusetts.

(Reporting by Nate Raymond Jack Queen; Editing by Nia Williams and Diane Craft)