A family that was deported to Mexico requests an investigation into abuses that say they faced the arrest of the United States, according to a civil rights complaint obtained for the first time by NBC News. The family of the mixed immigration state, including four American citizen children, one of whom is a 10 -year -old girl who is recovering from brain surgery, is in an area of Mexico where, they say, they fear for their safety.
The Texas civil rights project, a legal organization and litigation that represents the family, filed the complaint on Monday before the Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties of the National Security Department in the name of the family.
The complaint alleges that customs and border protection, which arrested and deported the family last month, committed “serious abuses” when he denied medical attention to the 10 -year -old girl, arrested American citizen children “in deplorable conditions” and took them to Mexico, “where their lives are in danger due to their state as US citizens,” among other claims.
Trump’s border tsar, Tom Homan, said “families can deport together,” regardless of their status. Homan said it would depend on parents to decide whether to leave the United States together or leave their children behind. In this case, parents took their children with them so that the family could remain together.
Rochelle Garza, president of the Texas civil rights project, told NBC News: “We are also asking for humanitarian probation for the family,” so that the girl’s undocumented parents can take care of her while her recovery continues after she underwent surgery in Texas to eliminate a brain tumor last year.
The mother told NBC News exclusively about the terrible experience of her family last week.
She said that it all started on February 3, when they rushed from the Rio Grande Valley, along the southeast border of Texas with Mexico, where they lived, to Houston, where their daughter’s specialist doctors are found for a emergency medical check -up.
On the way there, they stopped at an immigration control point in the United States, one that have passed several times when they have led to Houston. Parents were equipped with letters from their doctors and lawyers to show officers at the control point to pass. But the letters were not enough this time.
The immigration authorities arrested the parents after they could not show legal immigration documentation. According to his lawyer, Daniel Woodward, apart from the lack of “valid immigration state in the United States”, the parents do not have “criminal record.” He added that the parents were in the process of obtaining V visas, a temporary immigration benefit for victims of human trafficking.
Five of his children, 15, 13, 10, 8 and 6, four of whom are US citizens, were with them when they were arrested. Parents and children were taken to a detention center, where they spent 24 hours before being placed in a truck and dropped on the side of Mexico on a Texas bridge on February 4.
NBC News are the names of family members, because they were deported to an area in Mexico that is known for kidnapping US citizens.
Since the family was deported, the 10 -year -old has not been able to obtain the follow -up attention he needs. Since the swelling in his brain had not yet disappeared completely, he has difficulties with speech and mobility on the right side of his body, his mother said. He was routinely registering with the doctors who monitored his recovery, attending rehabilitation therapy sessions and taking medications to prevent seizures, said his mother.
His 15 -year -old son, who is an American citizen, and his 13 -year -old daughter, who is not, also have serious medical conditions. Both live with a heart disorder known as long QT syndrome, which causes irregular heartbeat and can be deadly if not well. The son uses a monitor that tracks his heart rate.
The complaint alleges that the CBP medical team knew that he had custody of “three children with complex medical needs, one of whom complained about urgent and serious symptoms, two of whom were US citizens.” And yet, CBP did not transfer any of the children, in particular to the 10 -year -old girl, to a hospital or other medical care center “to obtain a pediatric medical review” as required by the Flores Agreement Agreement, which regulates how minors must be treated in federal immigration custody, says the complaint.
“Instead of giving him that attention, CBP forced a child who was still recovering from brain surgery to sleep in a hot, dirty and illuminated cell,” says the complaint.
The complaint also describes additional claims that allege that children were inappropriate during detention, “including palmadites of sensitive parts of their bodies”, and that parents were denied “adequate access to their lawyer.”
A DHS spokesman said in a statement that the reports of the family situation are “inaccurate” because when “someone receives accelerated elimination orders and chooses to ignore them, they will face the consequences” of the process. The spokesman said that privacy reasons prevented talking about the details of the case.
President Donald Trump and the officials of his administration have repeatedly said that they are limiting illegal immigration and prioritizing the deportation of immigrants who have committed serious crimes.
But for Woodward, “this case really emphasizes that the administration is taking its resources and using it to take energetic measures against these people who really are the species of spine and the engine of our economy that do things like packing our products and choosing our vegetables.”
The parents represent that Woodward arrived in the United States from Mexico in 2013 and settled in Texas with the hope of “a better life for the family,” the mother told NBC News. She and her husband worked in a series of works, which include collecting and packing products, to keep their six children. The couple also has a 17 -year -old son, who is an American citizen, who was left behind in Texas after they were deported.
“It is a really difficult time in someone’s life, being 17, entering his last year of high school,” said Garza, of the Texas Civil Rights project, “and going through that separated period of time from his family is absolutely unimaginable.
“Then, recovering the family is also about protecting it and making sure it is with their family,” he added.
