BREAKING: A Medical examiner just ruled the death of a nearly blind refugee abandoned by Border Patrol a HOMICIDE.
It’s official. What happened to Nurul Amin Shah Alam on a frigid winter night in Buffalo wasn’t an accident. It was a homicide due to the negligence of federal Customs and Border Patrol agents.
Erie County’s medical examiner ruled Wednesday that Shah Alam — the nearly blind, English-speaking Rohingya refugee from Myanmar who was dumped outside a closed coffee shop by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents on a cold February night — died of “complications of a perforated ulcer precipitated by hypothermia and dehydration.”
In plain English: he froze. He dehydrated. The stress burst open an ulcer inside his body. And he died alone on a Buffalo street because federal agents left a nearly blind man who spoke no English outside a closed shop in the dead of winter and drove away.
Nobody called his family. Nobody told his attorney. Nobody made sure he was safe.
“Nobody told me or my family or attorney where my dad was dropped off,” his son Mohamad Faisal told Reuters.
CBP’s official response — that they dropped Shah Alam at “a warm, safe location near his last known address” and that he “showed no signs of distress, mobility issues, or disabilities requiring special assistance” — is not just insulting. It is obscene. The coffee shop was closed. The man was nearly blind. He spoke no English. He had no phone. And he couldn’t be deported — CBP’s own agents knew he was a legal refugee with no removal order. They picked him up anyway, drove him across town, and left him in the dark.
New York Attorney General Letitia James said Shah Alam “fled genocide to build a life in this country. Instead, he was abandoned and left to suffer alone in his final hours.” Buffalo Mayor Sean Ryan called it “unprofessional and inhumane” and “a dereliction of duty.” Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz stood at a podium Wednesday and said he wished he could release the full autopsy to the public — but state law prevented him.
This is who Nurul Amin Shah Alam was: a Rohingya Muslim who survived one of the worst ethnic cleansing campaigns of the 21st century in Myanmar. He made it to America. He made it to Buffalo. He had a family — a wife, children — who loved him and searched desperately for him when he disappeared. He had already survived the unimaginable. He did not, however, survive CBP.
New York Attorney General Letitia James said Shah Alam “fled genocide to build a life in this country. Instead, he was abandoned and left to suffer alone in his final hours.” Buffalo Mayor Sean Ryan called it “unprofessional and inhumane” and “a dereliction of duty.” Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz stood at a podium Wednesday and said he wished he could release the full autopsy to the public, but state law prevented him.
His family survived genocide. America was supposed to be the safe part of the story. Until it wasn’t.
Please like and share this account if you believe what happened to Nurul Amin Shah Alam was wrong — and that the people responsible must be held accountable.