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(CNN) - An immigration judge granted asylum to a Connecticut high school student whose arrest caused a great deal of support from teachers and classmates.
Mario Aguilar, 18, was released from the custody of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service (ICE), Tuesday afternoon, hours after the defenders held a press conference asking for his release.
"He's on his way home," lawyer Dalia Fuleihan wrote in an email to CNN.
After ICE arrested Aguilar in September, the teachers sent him homework so he would not be left behind and traveled to court hearings to see a friendly face.
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The students kept their seats, made “release Mario” posters at the school press and joined for their release.
The English teacher Cynthia Clampitt wrote instructions for Mario in sticky notes in the homework package she sent him.
The Wilbur Cross High School community in New Haven, Connecticut, which CNN presented in a story in early December, had been anxiously awaiting a ruling in the case for weeks.
Aguilar's supporters said they finally had good news on Monday when lawyers received written notice of the judge's ruling.
On Tuesday, community leaders who spoke with reporters from WFSB, a CNN subsidiary, and other local media at a press conference at City Hall, warned that the court's decision was only a partial victory. The defenders said they were worried that the teenager could spend more months behind bars if the government decides to appeal the judge's decision.
Fuleihan said Tuesday night that it is still unclear whether the Department of Homeland Security will appeal.
ICE has 30 days to decide whether to appeal
A spokeswoman for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service said the agency "does not comment on issues / claims / allegations not related to the status of compliance of a detainee without a privacy waiver signed by the individual."
ICE attorneys have 30 days after a ruling to tell a judge if they will appeal. If so, the procedures could continue for up to a year, Fuleihan said.
A bulletin board dedicated to Mario Aguilar hangs in the hall of Wilbur Cross High School in New Haven, Connecticut. Since ICE arrested Aguilar in September, the students, teachers and administrators of the school have been pushing for his release.
Aguilar was born in Guatemala and arrived in the United States as an unaccompanied minor in 2018. His lawyers say he fled after being persecuted and in search of security.
ICE deportation officers arrested him in September before a Connecticut court where he was charged after a car accident, including driving under the influence of alcohol, operating a motor vehicle without a license and not insuring a private motor vehicle.
An ICE spokesman told CNN earlier this month that he had been arrested for immigration violations and that expulsion proceedings were pending.
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Aguilar's defenders say he crashed into a parked car after his cell phone slipped off the board and bent down to pick it up. They argue that a sobriety test was never conducted and that the charge for driving under the influence of alcohol had not been delayed in court.
The lawyers have been pressing for months for ICE to release him, arguing that he is not a dangerous person or that he represents a risk of escape, and that he deserves to return to his community and continue his studies.
Wilbur Cross students made stickers with the #bringmariohome label at the school press and sold them to raise money for their police station.
He did not receive the homework sent by the teachers
Ann Brillante, deputy director of Wilbur Cross, told CNN that the school's teachers have a good reason for their student to return to class.
"It's urgent," he said. "Every minute counts in terms of learning English and in terms of moving towards graduation."
The teachers told CNN that they were devastated to learn recently that the homework they sent never reached their student. An envelope full of worksheets was returned to Aguilar's lawyer, stamped “return to sender. Rejected". A handwritten note on the stamp read: "Name unknown" and "ID number required."
Unable to continue with his school work while in detention, Aguilar is late in his classes, Brillante said. But the teachers, he said, will do everything possible to help them get on track.
"When he returns, he will have a clean slate," he said.
For the students, the case has been an education unlike anything in a book, the school principal told reporters on Tuesday.
"I think it's a wonderful lesson in civic education for all of our students to learn about our systems and even the broken parts of our system that need to be repaired," said principal Edith Johnson. "And I know that this beautiful group of students that I run at that school will be part of the solution to repair a broken system."
Guatemala Immigration United States