Case 1:25-cv-01935-JME Document 78 Filed 03/19/25
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Cnty., No. 24-CV-3850 (LTS), 2024 WL 3318225, at *1 (S.D.N.Y. June 17, 2024); Bynum v.
N.J., No. 24-CV-618 (LTS), 2024 WL 1023210, at *1 (S.D.N.Y. Feb. 26, 2024); Moussaoui v.
Biden, No. 25-CV-691 (JGK), 2025 WL 457804, at *2 (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 28, 2025); Darboe v.
Ahrendt, 442 F. Supp. 3d 592, 596 (S.D.N.Y. 2020); see also, e.g., United States v. Posey, No.
16-CR-87 (RJA), 2023 WL 7124522, at *2 (W.D.N.Y. Oct. 30, 2023) (noting a court’s “broad
discretion” under Section 1406(a) “to transfer a habeas case to the proper judicial district”).
Section 1406(a) provides for transfer “to any district . . . in which [the case] could have
been brought.” Id. (emphasis added). By its plain terms, therefore, the statute calls for transfer
of Khalil’s Petition to the District of New Jersey, the only district in which due to the
immediate-custodian and district-of-confinement rules his “core” claims “could have been
brought” at 4:40 a.m. on March 9, 2025. See, e.g., Alvarado v. Gillis, No. 22-CV-10082 (JLR)
(KHP), 2023 WL 5417157 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 3, 2023), report and recommendation adopted, 2023
WL 5396499 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 22, 2023) (ordering transfer of an immigration habeas petition to
the district where the petitioner was detained at the time of filing); Ali v. DHS/ICE/Dep’t of
Justice, No. 19-CV-8645 (LGS), 2020 WL 3057383, at *2 (S.D.N.Y. June 9, 2020) (same);
Persaud v. ICE, No. 04-CV-282 (FB), 2004 WL 1936213, at *1 (E.D.N.Y. Aug. 31, 2004)
(“Although petitioner is currently confined in Alabama, at the time that he filed this petition he
was confined in the Western District of Louisiana. Accordingly, the Court orders the petition to
be transferred to the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.”); cf.
Fuentes v. Choate, No. 24-CV-1377 (NYW), 2024 WL 2978285, at *10-11 (D. Colo. June 13,
2024) (observing that when transfer is necessary due to improper venue under Padilla, “many
courts choose to transfer habeas cases” to the district where the action “could have been brought
at the time it was filed or noticed”). Indeed, the Court cannot do otherwise because where, as
here, “a federal statute covers the point in dispute,” “that is the end of the matter; federal courts
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