An imam originally from Pakistan faces being deported back to his home country after being held in detention by US immigration agents for abusing the US visas of his religious workers.
Hafiz Abdul Hannan, the leader of the Masjid Al-Islam mosque in New Haven, Connecticut since 2013, was arrested on Friday at his home, according to officials with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Hannan has previously been convicted of committing fraud in relation to immigration documents and is to stay in custody until he is removed from the United States, Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman Shawn Neudauer stated.
Published reports indicate that Hannan was previously arrested back in 2006 together with several dozen other individuals across eight states as well as the District of Columbia as part of an alleged scheme involving immigrants who arrived in the United States and were able to stay with the use of fake applicants for US visas for religious workers.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement said that those immigrants that were arrested were actually performing secular roles such as factory workers, gas station attendants and truck drivers, though the incident was dismissed as an administrative error by leaders of the Islamic community based in Massachusetts.
Members of the community have been asked not to talk to the media about the current situation by a post on the mosque’s website. Hannan has previously been a chaplain at the Middlesex House of Correction in the Massachusetts town of Billerica. He was also leader of the Islamic Society of Greater Lowell in Chelmsford, Massachusetts.