With this blog post, I would like to take the opportunity to briefly explain the work I do with AI Justice as a HM Volunteer. Specifically, I work as a paralegal with the Children’s Legal Project. Within our project, there are two supervising attorneys, a staff attorney, two paralegals, and myself.
Our principal duties are to travel to the two Miami immigration centers that house unaccompanied immigrant minors who have been detained by the federal government for entering the United States without proper documentation and inspection (in other words, they are undocumented immigrants below the age of 18). The vast majority of the minors at these shelters come from Central America (Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador). At the two shelters, we conduct “Know Your Rights” presentations with all of the new children each week, seeking to explain to them their legal rights within the U.S. We also conduct individual intakes with each child, assessing their histories and (heartbreaking!) stories for any sign of their potential qualification for legal relief within the U.S. Later, the other paralegals and I compile each minor’s file, and the attorneys evaluate each case to determine what, if any, legal options each minor has.
For all of the children, the government allows them to be released to a relative within the United States so that they can be in the comfort of a loved one’s home instead of remaining detained, as they wait for their hearing before immigration court. For the minors who are released, our office sends out referrals for those who potentially qualify for legal relief. We also send the minors a letter explaining immigration court as well as a list of nonprofit agencies in their area that they can call for assistance.
Occasionally, some minors have no relatives within the U.S. who are able to sponsor them out of the shelter, so these minors either choose to be voluntarily deported back to their countries, or, if they qualify for legal relief, AI Justice and the legal clinic at Florida International University (FIU) represent them in their pursuit of a visa and legal status.
Many, many minors who travel to the U.S. from Latin America (and other parts of the world) bring with them a difficult past. They have been abandoned by their mothers, living on the streets with nowhere to go, beaten by their stepfathers, mistreated by their fathers . . . Under federal immigration law, there is the possibility for a visa for these minors, some of the most vulnerable members of society. The Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SIJS) is a special visa for minors who have been abandoned, abused, and/or neglected by their parents. Rather than deporting these children into the dangerous and potentially life-threatening domestic situations back in their home country, the U.S. government is open to granting these children a hearing before the Juvenile Court and allocating a visa to keep them safe within this country.
For a minor to qualify for SIJS, s/he must first be declared Dependent by a Juvenile Court of the state in which s/he is residing (in our situation, Florida). Next, the State Court must issue a Best Interest Order, in which the court determines that it is in the Best Interest of the minor to remain in the United States and not be returned to the dangerous situation in their home country, where the abandonment, abuse, and/or neglect is likely to reoccur. Next, the Best Interest Order is sent to United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) with a petition for Special Immigrant Juvenile Status. After several months of background checks and an interview, USCIS grants the SIJS (as long as there have been no problems!), making the minor immediately eligible to apply for Legal Permanent Residency and move forward with creating a better life in this country. (Because their visa is based on a history of parental abandonment, abuse, and/or neglect, these minors are barred from ever petitioning to bring their parents to the U.S.)
During the last fourteen months, I have assisted with about ten or fifteen of these cases, and it is a very rewarding experience to help in giving hope to these minors who, through no fault of their own, have endured such trauma and have been robbed of the childhood that you and I enjoyed growing up safe in the U.S. They want nothing more than a better life, free of the violence and suffering they have been through. I realize that the people in this country have very strong opinions about immigration and our current immigration situation, but I hope that we can all agree that these specific cases deserve special consideration. We should all see this humanitarian gesture for what it truly is—a demonstration of our compassion for these children, the most vulnerable population in the world, and our commitment to keeping them safe from parental abuse and neglect. Deporting them back to their countries into the hands of those who have mistreated them for years and years would be an injustice for us all.
While interviewing the children in the shelters, one thing is especially shocking about the stories their journey from Central America to the U.S. border, journeys they often make alone, without family or money or even a plan. They just decide one day to leave their past behind and move north, hoping for a better life. I am going to conclude this blog post by sharing a link to a 2009 HBO documentary film directed by Rebecca Cammisa: “Which Way Home” won an Emmy and was nominated for an Academy Award. It shows the dangers and obstacles faced by immigrants, through the eyes of children who make the difficult journey on their own through Mexico to the U.S. If you have some free time and immigration issues interest you, I highly recommend taking the time to watch the film. [You need to first click on the red "play" button in the middle of the video. A new window or tab may open in your browser, but you can close it and go back to the movie, where you will then be able to play it. This video limits the amount of time you can watch, so you may have to watch half of the video and then come back later to skip forward and watch the second half.]
"Which Way Home" - an HBO Documentary by Rebecca Cammisa
http://www.megavideo.com/?v=ZLL7Y27W
--Adam
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