University of San Francisco presses ICE to release detained nursing professor

Lawyer says 2013 withholding-of-removal order bars her removal to Nigeria

Nearly two months after agents with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement took Ann Lawani from her home in Lodi, California, her university has ramped up its calls for her release. Lawani, a nurse and a professor in the University of San Francisco’s nursing school, was arrested in September and has since been moved among detention centers in California, Texas, and Louisiana. “She needs to come home,” said Eileen Fry-Bowers, the school’s dean.

Lawani, 39, came to the United States in 2007 and built a career in nursing, completing master’s and doctoral degrees before entering academia. At the university she oversees two programs, one a master’s entry program for students coming to nursing from other fields and the other a bachelor’s program for students preparing to work in public health safety-net institutions. “She basically has her hands on almost 300 students that she engages with on a regular basis,” Fry-Bowers said.

Federal immigration officials say Lawani entered the country on a visitor’s visa in 2007, which she overstayed. She was issued a final order of removal in August 2013, according to a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson.

Natalia Santanna, Lawani’s lawyer, confirmed the removal order but said the department’s account was “incomplete.” “Dr Lawani applied for asylum within one year of being in the United States. And, in the same 2013 order, the immigration judge found that Ann would more likely than not face persecution in Nigeria and granted withholding of removal,” Santanna said. “That is not a temporary stay. It is a continuing bar to removal to Nigeria. Dr Lawani has lived in the United States pursuant to that grant of withholding of removal since 2013.”

Santanna said Lawani’s legal team has filed a habeas petition challenging the legality of her detention, which remains pending in California’s eastern district federal court.

Lawani’s detention has drawn outcry from local lawmakers, who have advocated on her behalf with ICE authorities, and from her students and colleagues, who say her absence is deeply felt on campus. Casey Murray, a nursing science graduate student, described Lawani as a warm educator who could recall the first and last names of students she had not seen since orientation. “We have 37 days left until we graduate,” Murray said. “She has supported us to the fullest extent up until the point that she was kidnapped. We want her at our graduation, and we want her home with her family.”

Lawani texted Fry-Bowers shortly after her arrest to say she was in ICE custody. Fry-Bowers, who was on vacation at the time, had already heard from another dean that Lawani had missed a meeting, an absence she described as out of character. After Lawani’s family contacted the school, it helped arrange legal representation and took its concerns to the area’s congressional delegation.

In late October, Representative Josh Harder, who represents Lawani’s district, raised her case with Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin. Among the concerns he cited were the lack of notice before her arrest and the fact that her changing locations were not reflected in an online detainee database. “Given her longstanding compliance, lack of criminal history, and substantial community ties, there is no apparent public safety justification for keeping her detained thousands of miles from home while her case proceeds,” Harder wrote in a letter.

Fry-Bowers pointed to Lawani’s clinical work with patients in hospice and palliative care. “She cares for the most vulnerable, helps them maintain their dignity and comfort as they prepare for death,” she said. “She is a consummate professional. The highest praise I could ever give a nursing colleague is that I would want them taking care of my family member or myself, and she would be at the top of the list.”