DETROIT (AP) – A woman from Guatemala says that she and her two children born in the United States were detained for almost a week by agents in Detroit after the instructions of a telephone application to the nearest Costco led them to an international bridge connecting the city to Canada.
She is now faced with the procedure for referring in June before the immigration court, according to Ruby Robinson, lawyer senior director of Michigan Immigrant Rights Center.
Robinson, the American representative Rashida Tlaib and Michigan on Thursday, on Thursday, Michigan Aclu called for more responsibility and transparency by American customs and the protection of the border of detention along the northern nation border with Canada.
“Our neighbors and families should not disappear because they have made a bad turn,” said Tlaib.
Although the north border sees much fewer meetings with migrants than the American-Mexican border, the case of women is not uncommon, according to Tlaib.
The Michigan Democrat said that it had been informed on March 21 by CBP that 213 people had been detained in the same place since January, with more than 90% of driving in the Pont toll. Tlaib also told him that 12 families had been detained in the same building where Robinson's customer was detained.
“We do not know exactly what is happening. There is a lack of transparency,” she said, adding that similar detentions are probably occurring elsewhere along the northern border of 5,525 miles (8,891 kilometers).
But customs and border protection said that the agents met just over 200 undocumented people from January 20 to March 21 at Detroit crossings. According to a CBP spokesperson.
Michigan Immigrant Rights Center represents the Guatemalan woman. Robinson refused to release her name or age, only confirming that she has been in the United States for about six years, but has no legal status. His daughters, aged 5 and 1, were born in the United States, their father lives in Detroit.
She lives in the southwest of Detroit, a district with a large Hispanic population which is in the shade of the Ambassador bridge and just in front of the Detroit river in Windsor, Ontario.
On March 8, the woman and her daughters were in a vehicle led by her 19 -year -old brother. She used a telephone application to find the nearest costco and did not realize that the nearest store was on the Canadian side of the bridge, Robinson said in a zoom call with journalists.
They rolled in the Pont toll square, but did not exceed the toll tickets. They were arrested by CBP agents and led to a neighboring building where it was interviewed and fingerprint. It also signed a form indicating that it has entered the United States illegally.
She said that the agents told her that she was going to be expelled and encouraged her to take her daughters with her return to Guatemala, according to Robinson.
They were held in a small window without windows, slept on beds and gave microwave food like ramen noodles and oat flour. They were only allowed to leave the room to use the toilet and the shower, she said.
Monday evening, March 10, her youngest girl began to develop a fever. The woman said that the agents had told her that they had no drug for the child. The eldest girl would soon fall with a cough.
While going to the bathroom this Tuesday, the family finally saw their brother in a corridor. The woman said he was in chains. His brother also has no legal status in the United States and works as a roofer with the father of his children, she said.
Wednesday evening, the girls were given to the woman's sister-in-law. She was released the next day.
“When individuals violate immigration laws, their choices make them submit to detention and abolition,” said Deputy Affairs of Public Affairs of the CBP, Hilton Beckham, in a statement. “She admitted to having entered the United States in 2018. By policy, CBP worked to find an appropriate tutor for her children American citizens. However, she initially chose to keep them with her, extending the period of detention. Once the children were placed with a tutor, she was transferred to ice.”
These detentions are part of a model where short -term installations are used in the long term by the CBP, said Tlaib, which sits on the US chamber supervision committee.
“Erosion of the regular procedure is a threat to all of us – regardless of your name, regardless of immigration status,” said Tlaib. “A bad turn should not lead to a disappearance and erosion of someone's regular procedure.”
