Indian arrested at airport has left U.S.

Washington: Vijay Kumar, the Indian filmmaker arrested in the United States and jailed for 20 days for carrying brass knuckles and “Jihadi literature” in his baggage, has left the U.S. for India, his lawyer has confirmed.
Speaking to The Hindu on Tuesday evening Mr. Kumar’s attorney, Grant Scheiner, said “Mr. Kumar is safely out of Houston.” He hoped that appropriate action would be taken to ensure that such an event did not occur again in the future.
Mr. Kumar’s departure from Houston marks the culmination of a difficult few weeks for him. Trapped in the U.S., initially under suspicion of terror related activities although his intentions were entirely benign, Mr. Kumar faced an ordeal in a Texas jail, where he had to subsist on only bread and water. He also had no certainty as to when he would be released.
Mr. Scheiner had earlier said that Mr. Kumar’s arrest was a mistake of law combined with excessive caution in a post-9/11 era, and as a result he had been slapped with both a criminal case, for possessing the brass knuckles, and an immigration case, after his visa revoked by the immigration authorities.
While Mr. Kumar had unwittingly violated a Texas law forbidding persons from carrying brass knuckles at airports, he had entirely abided by federal law on this matter. The real problem, his attorney earlier said, was that federal law was not consistent with the state law.
15/09/10 Narayan Lakshman/The Hindu

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Categories: airports Sep 2010, Foreign Sep 2010