Three years ago, Montana dad and undocumented immigrant Audemio Orozco-Ramirez said he was raped by a fellow inmate while in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody. Possible surveillance footage that may have captured the assault mysteriously disappeared. While no criminal charges were ever filed, Jefferson County’s Boulder jail settled with Orozco-Ramirez for $125,000. Now the dad of seven has yet again been targeted by ICE and is yet again facing possible deportation to Mexico within days:
Orozco-Ramirez’s children range between ages four and 19, according to the ACLU, six of whom are U.S. citizens. The oldest is a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipient who was given temporary deportation relief and work authorization thanks to an Obama-era executive action. But he may not be able to travel to visit his father if he’s deported. That’s because the Trump administration has effectively ended advance parole, the only way for DACA recipients to exit and re-enter the United States.
Orozco-Ramirez, who has no criminal record, has been in custody since August 2017, when he was taken in by mass deportation agents during what he assumed was a routine check-in. Rather than spending tax dollars prioritizing people who actually do pose a threat to public safety, an unleashed ICE has been sweeping up immigrants who have just been trying to follow the rules in what advocates have termed “silent raids.” Now, Orozco-Ramirez could become their latest victim.
According to Splinter report, ICE initially intended to deport Orozco-Ramirez after taking him into custody last August, with his attorney attributing “the unusual speed to the high-profile rape allegations Orozco-Ramirez made while he was in federal immigration custody in 2013.” A judge temporarily blocked his deportation pending an appeal, but it was unsuccessful. Now, he appears to be yet again at risk of deportation:
The ICE agency’s arrest of Orozco-Ramirez during his routine immigration check-in is set against the background of an administration steadfast in its commitment to broaden the scope of “criminal” violations punishable by deportation. Many immigrants, including people with green cards, who committed and served out criminal sentences decades ago are now finding themselves in ICE custody. The ICE agency detained prominent immigrant-rights activist Ravi Ragbir in New York City earlier this month for a 2001 conviction for wire fraud. Jean Montrevil, another immigrant rights activist who was convicted of possession of cocaine and served 11 years in prison, was deported to Haiti last week. And ICE agents recently detained Dr. Lukasz R. Niec, a Polish immigrant who holds a green card and lives in Michigan over “administrative violations” for misdemeanors he committed in 1992 as a teenager.
Splinter adds that Orozco-Ramirez may have been eligible for a U-visa, which gives status to “victims of certain crimes who have suffered mental or physical abuse and are helpful to law enforcement or government officials in the investigation or prosecution of criminal activity,” but “according to The Helena Independent Record, ICE ‘would not certify’ that Orozco-Ramirez had cooperated.” Think Progress also notes that as part of the civil lawsuit, the jail “did not admit fault”:
“My mom doesn’t want us to go out there because she just had one of her brothers murdered by the bad people,” Juan told MTPR in reference to the thought of having to visit his father in Mexico if he gets deported. “Yeah, he was… it was bad he was decapitated, shot sixteen times, tortured, burned up.”
“My client was the victim of a sexual assault while in ICE custody, and instead of taking responsibility for this, ICE is trying to sweep this under the rug by deporting him,” his attorney Shahid Haque said upon Orozco-Ramirez’s initial arrest. “He should be released and returned to his family who needs him.”