Photo from Go Fund Me page

Benton, Arkansas

Kapil Raghu was delivering a pizza on May 3, 2025, when Benton police pulled him over for having a reflective covering over his license plate. After pressuring him into letting them search his vehicle, officers found a bottle of perfume labeled “Opium,” accused Raghu of possessing an illegal substance and took him to the Saline County jail. Benton is a suburb of Little Rock.

A district court judge dismissed the drug charge after the Arkansas State Crime Lab concluded that the substance was indeed perfume. But in the meantime, authorities had discovered that Raghu’s visa had expired, according to reporting by the Saline Courier and the Guardian. Raghu was turned over to ICE, which sent him to a federal immigration detention center in Louisiana.

Raghu, an Indian national, had married Ashley Mays, a U.S. citizen, a few weeks before the traffic stop. He was pursuing American citizenship. The couple had submitted visa renewal paperwork to an attorney who failed to file it, according to Mays. “We were actively working to fix his status the right way,” she wrote on the couple’s Go Fund Me page. They have hired new counsel and refiled.

“He spent weeks behind bars, away from his family, stripped of his dignity, and treated like a criminal when his only ‘crime’ was overstaying a visa while we worked on his case,” said Mays.

Raghu was freed after 30 days, but his legal position remains precarious. “It is my understanding that, though released, Kapil now has a ‘deportation’ status, meaning he can be immediately deported for any minor offense, even jaywalking,” Mike Laux, Raghu’s attorney, told the Guardian. “But, more crucially, this classification bars him from working and earning money for his family, which has been devastating for them.”

With Raghu out of the employment picture, Mays has been working three jobs to cover legal fees that have consumed their savings, once intended for a home. Her 10-year-old daughter has started counseling.

“This has been one of the most painful experiences of our lives,” Mays said.