...some more background...it seems someone on a watch list was using his name as an alias...which triggered the temporary detention:
"Hassan Aden, 52, of Alexandria, Virginia spent 26 years with the Alexandria Police Department before leaving in 2012 to become chief of police in Greenville, North Carolina. He retired from the 250-person force in 2015.
Aden says he was returning from Paris on March 13, where he had been celebrating his mother's 80th birthday.
When he arrived at customs at JFK, he expected to be handed back his passport and told "welcome home" like everyone else. Instead, a
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer asked him: "Are you traveling alone?" Aden replied he was and the officer said, "Let's take a walk," in Aden's recollection."
...
He said he was escorted to a makeshift office, prohibited from using his cellphone and given little information about the reason for the holdup. At one point, Aden said he asked an officer how much time could pass for a detention to be considered reasonable. The officer replied that Aden wasn't being detained.
But inside the room, where there were three desks staffed by CBP employees and two dozen chairs, signs read "Remain seated at all times" and "Use of telephones strictly prohibited."
"Two signs that this was not voluntary; this was indeed a detention," Aden said.
Aden said he told an officer he was a retired police chief and a career law enforcement officer, but the man said he had "no control" over the situation and it "didn't matter" what his job was. Another officer explained that someone on a "watch list" had been using Aden's name as an alias, and his information was being cross-checked with another agency, Aden said.
Former North Carolina police chief says he was detained at JFK Airport because of his name
