{"id":11450,"date":"2025-06-24T18:49:10","date_gmt":"2025-06-24T18:49:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/11450\/"},"modified":"2025-06-24T18:49:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-24T18:49:10","slug":"ice-arrests-11-undocumented-iranian-nationals-including-2-in-houston-over-weekend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/11450\/","title":{"rendered":"ICE arrests 11 undocumented Iranian Nationals, including 2 in Houston, over weekend"},"content":{"rendered":"

HOUSTON<\/strong> \u2013 The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested 11 undocumented Iranian nationals, including two arrests in Houston, over the weekend, announced U.S. Department of Homeland Security.<\/p>\n

The arrests were in direct response to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem\u2019s commitment to \u201ckeeping known and suspected terrorists out of American communities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those arrested included an individual with admitted ties to Hezbollah, a known or suspected terrorist, and an alleged former sniper for the Iranian army, according to DHS.<\/p>\n

Houston arrests<\/b><\/p>\n

In Houston, ICE arrested Hamid Reza Bayat, an Iranian national an immigration judge ordered removed nearly 20 years ago, on Aug. 4, 2005. <\/p>\n

Twice convicted of drug crimes and once convicted of driving on a suspended license, Bayat served time before receiving his final order of removal. He\u2019s now in ICE custody pending removal proceedings. <\/p>\n

Hamid Reza Bayat, an Iranian national (Copyright 2025 by KPRC Click2Houston – All rights reserved.)<\/p>\n

On June 22, ICE Houston officials arrested Behzad Sepehrian Bahary Nejad, an undocumented immigrant with a final order of removal, who was carrying a loaded 9mm pistol at the time of his arrest, according to DHS.<\/p>\n

Sepehrian reportedly entered the U.S. in Houston on Dec. 9, 2016, on an F-1 student visa. On Aug. 19, 2017, law enforcement in Harris County arrested him for assaulting a family member by impeding breathing; his wife told the local assistant district attorney that Sepehrian was threatening her and obtained a restraining order against him. She also alleged he was threatening her family in Iran. <\/p>\n

Behzad Sepehrian Bahary Nejad (Copyright 2025 by KPRC Click2Houston – All rights reserved.)<\/p>\n

On July 23, 2018, the University of Texas terminated Sepehrian\u2019s status after he was placed on academic suspension. <\/p>\n

An immigration judge ordered him removed on Oct. 10, 2019, after he was released on an immigration bond; he filed a motion to reopen his case, which a Department of Justice immigration judge denied. Sepehrian is in ICE custody pending removal proceedings.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 by KPRC Click2Houston – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON \u2013 The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested 11 undocumented Iranian nationals, including two arrests in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11451,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5130],"tags":[4219,4345,425,50,358,3187],"class_list":{"0":"post-11450","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-crime","9":"tag-houston","10":"tag-local","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-texas","13":"tag-tx"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114739843166437786","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11450\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}