May 22, 2008 - In Massachusetts, US Senators Edward M. Kennedy and then-Senator John F. Kerry filed legislation that would have made Fenway High School teacher Obain Attouoman a resident. The legislation delayed Attouoman's deportation, but the bill expired last year because Congress never acted on it.
Attouoman came to America on an exchange visa in the early 1990s and reportedly sought political asylum. Along the way, though, he misread a notice in which he was given a court hearing date to argue his case, leading a judge to order his deportation.[TT - We're guessing the source of that paragraph is his attorney. A 2005 article was a little more candid.
Attouoman's fight to stay in the country started in 2001, when he missed an asylum hearing before an immigration judge because he misread the date. A judge ordered him deported to his native Ivory Coast, and he lost two appeals.Attouoman was deported Wednesday.
