Do not exit without an exit interview: An encounter with the INS!

May 9, 2003.

I am writing this short note so others, especially students from countries whose male citizens have to specially register with the INS, will not end up facing the kind of situation I faced a few days ago.

My name is Bilal Zuberi and I am a citizen of Pakistan, currently studying in the US on an F-1 visa. I am completing my graduate studies at MIT and am expected to defend my Ph.D. thesis next month. As a student of Physical Chemistry, I was recently invited to join a field research campaign on understanding the chemistry of air pollution in Mexico City for the month of April. My research advisor, a Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, was heading the campaign and had invited me to join the international (US, Europe, Mexico) team of 150 researchers. My encounter with the INS occurred at the culmination of this research trip.

I was expected to fly out to Mexico City from Boston on a Continental flight via Newark at 6:30 am on March 27th 2003. Since I had registered in the NSEERS system in the Boston offices of the INS in January, when the special registration procedure started, I remembered the INS agent telling me to arrive at the departure terminal at least 5-6 hours in advance of my flight. Hence, on the day of my flight, I arrived at the Boston Logan airport at 12:30 am, more than 5 hours before my scheduled departure time. I found the airport deserted at that time of the night, and after walking around for over an hour, I encountered nobody but

the custodial crew at all the relevant airport terminals. I inquired from the custodial staff if anybody from the INS or the airline was available for me to see, and the answer I got was, ?No, all offices are closed and only open when the flights start leaving or arriving?. I was perplexed why INS had asked me to come in early when airports didn?t even open 5-6 hours before early morning flights. Knowing that the INS offices elsewhere were also closed, I called the airline (Continental) 1-800 number and asked for information on this

situation. I explained to them that I was a citizen of Pakistan and had to specially register, and if they knew where was I supposed to proceed to.

The answer I got from a rather confident male voice on the phone was that there was no problem, that I could just go to the airport 2 hours in advance of my flight, that if the INS wished to speak to me they would stop me either in Boston or Newark and that the only important thing was to register when I re-entered the country. Knowing that I did not have any better info than this airline official, I followed his advice, and boarded the plane to Newark. At Newark, I asked the staff in the transit lounge the same question and I got a similar answer. ?

No special checking was necessary?, I was told. Hence, I boarded the plane

onwards to Mexico City, not knowing that I was in violation of an INS regulation the moment I crossed the border without getting an exit interview

done with the INS.

A few days after arriving in Mexico City, I received an e-mail from a friend at Stanford about a Yale student who was harassed by the INS for not having had an ?exit interview? and was sent away to Pakistan. I read the e-mail in disbelief, realizing that I was stuck in a similar situation. I immediately called my lawyers in Boston (luckily I had contacts with a law firm), and informed them of the situation. I wanted to know if I could do some paperwork while in Mexico City to let INS know I had no intentions of breaking any regulation and that I had indeed tried

my best to comply with INS requirements of reporting to the airport early before departing. My lawyer tried to find out more information but was told that all my hopes depended upon the person who would interview me and that she should prepare for posting bail and/or petitioning against INS (now called Bureau of Customs and Border Patrol of the Department of Homeland Security) if I was detained and/or denied entry. There is nothing that can be done pre-arrival at the airport.

I arrived at the Newark airport on May 5th and to my surprise, was informed

that no cell phones could be used before I passed the customs and immigration. I was not able to get in touch with my lawyers and friends, who were frantically waiting to hear from me. At the Immigration booth I was asked why I did not have an exit stamp in my passport. I told them about my experience in Boston and Newark and showed letters from my research advisor attesting that he was personally aware of my efforts to find INS since he had driven with me to the airport to drop me off. None of that made any difference to my case, and I was taken to a second office for a more through investigation.

What followed was less of an investigation and bordered on a quasi-criminal interrogation. The officer seemed aggressive and agitated that he had to deal with my case. I had to repeat my story several times and even though he took notes, it did not seem to register with him. Not surprisingly, he probably did not have very high qualifications and was quite rude in his interviewing tactics. I was scolded for listening to people other than the INS, the airline for example, and was repeatedly told that I was going to be denied entry. He was also quick to add that chances of me being allowed to enter were close to zero since I was a violator of INS laws. At one point during the interrogation he tried to make me confess to breaking an INS law intentionally, and since I knew what he was trying to do, thanks to legal advice I had received from the lawyers, I made sure I did not say yes to any wrong confession. I kept repeating to him that I did not intend to break any law, that I tried to get as much information as possible to make an informed decision, and had tried my best to comply with the law but did not locate any INS personnel that could give me better information than the airline staff. Fortunately for me, I did not lose calm during this process, even though it was quite un-nerving, and tried to talk him into at least listening to me patiently. He gave up upon my persistence, and informed me that his boss would make a final decision on me.

I was expecting a deportation when the officer came back after a brief

meeting with his boss and announced that this was my ? damn lucky day?. I was being given one chance, the benefit of the doubt, and was allowed to

enter the country. God only knows what worked, but

as my lawyer was told, it really did depend on the whim of this one person

and his boss that I was not sent back to Pakistan a few weeks before the

defense date for my thesis. I was further informed that a note was being

made into my records about this and that if I had any other infraction of

INS regulations, I would be denied entry into the country, forever! I

only thanked God for getting me out of this mess and breathed a sigh of

relief.

What followed was tenuous logistics of special registration. Due to what appeared as a glitch in the registration software, they could not enter the information into the file they had opened when I first registered in January, and hence they had to go through the whole ordeal again, name, parents info, credit cards, finger prints etc etc?. The process took nearly 3.5 hours and I indeed missed my connecting flight to Boston. However, the good thing was that I was not deported, unlike some of the other unlucky ones.

Needless to say, the message to be derived from my experience is to be extremely vigilant about INS/BCBP laws and regulations. All people who registered earlier with the INS should read the information packets that were handed out carefully and see what steps they should take when they are entering or leaving the country. Nobody (repeat nobody) can take that loosely and one must not listen to any advice given by agencies other than the INS itself. The airlines are continuing to misinform their passengers and are to be least trusted. It is the responsibility of the traveler to make sure they get an INS exit interview, and not the INS?s responsibility to be available at a given time. In certain cases, airports have INS staff present all 24 hours but in many other cases, it may

mean flying into the port of departure upto a day early to comply with the exit interview requirement. Flight bookings should be made to take this into consideration. I was told by the INS staff at Newark that even if my ticket costs $10,000 and I had 10 connecting flights taking me to my final destination, I should not leave the country without completing the exit interview requirement. One can always take a later plane, or deal with the hardships of awkward travel times, but if a person leaves without the exit interview, it can seriously endanger the possibility of returning to the US. For students, this is extremely important because it can result in a delay in studies of upwards of a semester. As per my experience at MIT, universities are least equipped to handle such cases and perhaps its not a bad idea to already have a lawyer in mind whom you can contact in case of any emergency. I was lucky to have a lawyer and friends ready to post bail for me if need arose, but perhaps others would not be so lucky automatically. I know most students have not thought of this and in times of crisis, they would be glad they thought of all these issues in advance. The purpose of this note is not to scare people and raise un-necessary fear, but to caution and to increase awareness about the severity of the situation. I have already heard of 3 such cases, and some reports claim upwards of 8-10 Pakistanis have been denied entry into the US for similar reasons.

Finally, I can only repeat that during these difficult times when the Department of Homeland Security regulations are complex, tiring, ever-changing and confusing, individuals from countries who are under tougher surveillance should make it a priority to be extremely careful to comply with all laws and regulations. Unfortunately the penalty system is not proportional to the mistake and? one strike and you are out? policy is being followed. While some of us continue to raise awareness and work on opposing biased, un-implemental and ill-structured laws, it is our duty to comply with all laws and regulations while we are visitors in this country.

Thanks,

Bilal Zuberi

Ph.D. Candidate in Physical Chemistry

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Cambridge, MA.

Current address:

Pacific Northwest National Laboratories

U.S. Department of Energy

Richland, WA