ACLU Files Lawsuit Challenging U.S. Government’s Unlawful Detention and Inhumane Treatment of Acquitted Man

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Nizar Trabelsi, a Tunisian national who was acquitted of terrorism-related charges last year, filed a lawsuit today in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia challenging his prolonged unlawful detention and inhumane treatment by the United States. Mr. Trabelsi is represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, the University of Chicago Law School’s Immigrants’ Rights Clinic, the ACLU of Virginia, and Professor Jonathan Hafetz of Seton Hall Law School.

In 2013, the United States forcibly extradited Mr. Trabelsi from Belgium to face criminal charges in the United States, where he spent almost 10 years in solitary confinement while in pretrial detention. After being cleared of all charges by a federal jury in July 2023, the U.S. immediately transferred him to immigration detention and wrongly treated him as an applicant for admission awaiting deportation.

In fact, it was the United States that brought Mr. Trabelsi to this country against his will for prosecution over a decade ago. The Belgian government has so far issued two formal diplomatic requests asking the U.S. to facilitate his return to Belgium, but the U.S. has refused. Instead, the government has indicated that it intends to deport him to Tunisia, where he was born, but where he is likely to face torture.

“We're witnessing the disturbing aftermath of a failed terrorism prosecution, where the government seems intent on punishing our client by any means necessary,” said Brett Max Kaufman, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Center for Democracy. “Justice, common sense, and the law demand that the government return him to Belgium and his loved ones.”

As the lawsuit explains, Mr. Trabelsi is kept in solitary confinement 23 hours a day, unable to communicate with his family, read books, or practice his religion. These conditions are even more restrictive than those he experienced during his 10-year-long pretrial detention, and his mental and physical health are deteriorating by the day.

“The government's treatment of Mr. Trabelsi is a grave injustice and a clear violation of his constitutional rights,” said Nicole Hallett, clinical professor of law and director of the Immigrants’ Rights Clinic at the University of Chicago Law School. “Our client’s ordeal has gone on way too long, and the court needs to step in.”

The lawsuit challenges the government's authority to detain Mr. Trabelsi, arguing that his detention violates the U.S.-Belgium Extradition Treaty, U.S. immigration law, and the Constitution, and that the U.S. government must facilitate his return to Belgium. It also seeks immediate improvements to Mr. Trabelsi's detention conditions.

“Mr. Trabelsi’s inhumane treatment in immigration detention is just the latest in a long string of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s violation of both the law and its own policies,” said Sophia Gregg, senior immigrants’ rights attorney at ACLU of Virginia. “ICE must be held accountable, and Mr. Trabelsi must be afforded the right to return to Belgium as the law requires.”

The complaint in Trabelsi v. Crawford was filed against Jeffrey Crawford, warden of the Farmville Detention Center where Mr. Trabelsi is being held; Liana Castano, ICE field office director for the Washington Field Office; Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security; and Merrick Garland, attorney general.