A federal judge in Vermont ruled Tuesday that a Customs and Border Protection agent improperly canceled the visa of a Harvard Medical School scientist from Russia who was charged with smuggling frog embryos into the United States.
Kseniia Petrova was returning from France when she was stopped at Logan International Airport on Feb. 16 last year. She had unclaimed frog embryo samples and slides in her luggage.
The ruling said CBP officers have limited authority to cancel visas, and the grounds “do not include a customs violation or even suspected smuggling of biological samples.
“The undisputed facts reveal that Ms. Petrova’s visa was impermissibly canceled because of the frog embryo samples and for no other reason,” US District Court Judge Christina Reiss wrote in her 21-page opinion.
CBP’s actions were arbitrary and capricious, not in accordance with the law, and exceeded the officers’ authority or jurisdiction, Reiss’s ruling said.
Petrova’s smuggling case is still pending in federal court.
CBP officials did not respond to requests for comment sent on Tuesday.
On Friday, a DHS spokesperson rejected ruling as a perversion of the facts by an activist judge, insisting Petrova “knowingly broke the law and took deliberate steps to evade it.”
“This activist judge’s ruling does not change the facts: The individual was lawfully detained after lying to federal officers about carrying substances into the country,” the spokesperson said in an email to the Globe.
A K9 inspection uncovered undeclared petri dishes, containers of unknown substances, and loose vials of embryonic frog cells, all without proper permits, the email said.
“Messages found on her phone revealed she planned to smuggle the materials through customs without declaring them,” the DHS spokesperson said.
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Petrova’s lawyer, Gregory Romanovsky, celebrated Tuesday’s ruling.
“Today’s decision marks an important step toward correcting what should never have happened in the first place,” Romanovsky said in an email to the Globe.
Petrova was taken to an immigration detention center in Vermont and then to an ICE facility in Louisiana. She was detained for nearly four months before she was released.
In December she successfully challenged the federal government in federal court in Boston, securing her right to work in the US.
“Since January, she has been back in her lab at Harvard, pursuing her life’s calling and advancing important scientific research,” Romanovsky’s email said.
“Today’s ruling makes clear that, as broad as CBP’s authority is at the border, its actions cannot be arbitrary or capricious,” Romanovsky added. “The United States remains a nation of laws — and those laws apply to all."
Petrova graduated from a renowned Russian physics and technology institute. She worked with a team investigating how to extend the human life span by studying the way cells rejuvenate. She also researched cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and other chronic ailments.
This story has been updated.
Tonya Alanez can be reached at tonya.alanez@globe.com. Follow her @talanez.