Judge Rules Against Government in No-Fly List Case

A judge ruled that existing procedures that govern the country’s no-fly policy do not provide adequate due process protections and ruled for the plaintiff that challenged the policy.

U.S. District Judge William Alsup ruled on a lawsuit filed by Rahinah Ibrahim who, according to court filings, was a student at Stanford in 2005.  Ibrahim was detained for two hours at San Francisco International Airport when travelling home to Malaysia because officials believed she was on the no-fly list.

Ibrahim has not been able to return to the U.S. because her visa was subsequently revoked.

The current no-fly list policy denies people suspected of having ties to terrorism from flying on commercial airlines.

The judge’s ruling said that the government has already conceded that Ibrahim is not a threat to national security  and ordered the government to remove her from the list and certify under oath that it in fact did so and/or to disclose whether she is on or off the list.

Ibrahim is entitled, the judge said, to have any mistaken information about her be corrected. “The government’s administrative remedies fall short of such relief and do not supply sufficient due process,” he wrote.

Numerous people have challenged the no-fly list in court but Ibrahim’s case, in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, is believed to have been the first to go to trial.

(Photo: Accura Media Group)