In response, also on Monday, the student filed a motion seeking the temporary restraining order, records show.
Separately Monday, MIT President Sally Kornbluth sent a letter to the campus community stating that nine people connected to the Cambridge institution have had their visas revoked.
At Tuesday’s hearing in federal court in Boston, lawyer Stephen J. Antwine said his client is set to graduate in six weeks and plans to pursue a PhD afterward. He said she found out from MIT that her F1 student visa was terminated on April 4.
Antwine argued that the student’s termination in a federal database that maintains information on students with visas, known as the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System, was unlawful, “arbitrary and capricious,” and that her “due process” rights were denied.
Antwine told the judge that his client did not engage in any activities that would usually lead to a termination, and that ICE has not presented evidence that she is a risk to national security or the public.
Antwine explained that the student had been charged with kidnapping in Cambridge District Court over an incident involving her then-boyfriend whom she had asked to leave her residence.
There seemed to be a “dispute of facts” in the case, Antwine said, and in December prosecutors dropped the charges and the case was formally dismissed in the court system.
However, while the criminal case was pending, the student’s F1 visa was terminated, but she was allowed to remain in the country because her SEVIS record was still active, Antwine said.
“The termination of the SEVIS record puts her out of status in the United States,” Antwine said.
US Judge Patti Saris said these cases have been “popping up all over the country,” and that she was “googling” information about the federal database and looking up the law regarding it.
Antwine said his client was further alarmed on Monday when the Department of State said she had to leave “immediately.”
Her legal team thought the student could face “serious immigration consequences” if she remained in the United States and is “subject to potential removal,” Antwine said.
Rayford A. Farquhar, deputy chief of the Civil Division of the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts, told the judge: “We are new to this as much as your honor is.”
Farquhar said he did not believe, to his understanding, that terminating the SEVIS record would make the student removable from the US.
“She’s not in imminent danger at this point of being picked up and removed from the United States,” Farquhar said.
The judge, however, did not seem convinced.
She said she recently had seen some “famous” cases where students were having their status terminated and were being arrested.
“They are being picked up,” Judge Saris said.
Saris ruled that Noem, Lyons, and any agents acting under their authority, are temporarily prohibited from arresting or detaining the student, terminating her database status, or transporting her out of state, before her next hearing on April 23, court filings show.
Tonya Alanez can be reached at tonya.alanez@globe.com. Follow her @talanez. Giulia McDonnell Nieto del Rio can be reached at giulia.mcdnr@globe.com. Follow her @giuliamcdnr.
