Federal immigration officials ignored not one, but two federal court orders in their mission to deport a Salvadoran asylum-seeker, civil rights advocates said.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of New Hampshire reveals Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deported Jose Daniel Guerra-Castañeda back to imminent danger despite court rulings keeping him in the U.S. while his asylum case is pending. He was then imprisoned in El Salvador over a false charge for nearly a year. ICE returned Guerra-Castañeda to the U.S. in November 2020. He’s now suing the federal government over his wrongful deportation.
“ICE’s violation of federal court orders to keep our client in the country cost him horrifying physical and emotional trauma that will last a lifetime,” said ACLU of New Hampshire Immigration Staff Attorney SangYeob Kim.
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“The lawsuit argues that officials at ICE and the Department of Homeland Security should have been aware of the order to keep Guerra-Castañeda in the country, and that Guerra-Castañeda’s treatment in El Salvador was the foreseeable result of the wrongful deportation in light of the false criminal claims against him,” the ACLU of New Hampshire said.
Those false charges were claims that he was a gang member and had committed aggravated homicide in El Salvador. “After learning of the issuance of the Red Notice, Plaintiff Guerra-Castañeda did not flee,” the court filing said. “He continued living at his then-current residence and working at his job.” He’d even gone to the Salvadoran consulate for more information about the allegations against him. It was on the way back home from the consulate when he was apprehended by ICE.
The court filing said that the charges “were false, unfounded, and ultimately dismissed by the Salvadoran government and Salvadoran court,” but not before he spent 297 days in prison, “where he experienced torture and other forms of physical and emotional trauma.” Guerra-Castañeda believes that an abusive uncle, who is a police officer in El Salvador, made up the false claims against him.
“The harm Plaintiff Guerra-Castañeda suffered was foreseeable,” the court filing said. “The United States government has known and documented the human rights abuses perpetrated by the Salvadoran government, including at Salvadoran prisons.” But officials deported him anyway, despite First Circuit orders staying his deportation. Civil rights advocates note the circuit is “just below the U.S. Supreme Court.” The ACLU of New Hampshire also represented Guerra-Castañeda in an effort to hold the federal government in contempt for the deportation. “No human being should be sent by the United States to a country where they will be tortured or persecuted before they ever have an opportunity to challenge their removal,” Kim continued.
“The ACLU said Guerra-Castañeda’s case is a part of a trend,” the Associated Press reported. “Nationwide, it said, it has documented at least eight cases in which ICE attempted to deport someone after a court ruled the person could stay.” We know that ICE has also targeted immigrant activists for speaking out against deportation and detention policies, including extensive surveillance of advocates on social media.
But ICE is in reality a threat to all regardless of legal status. The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office said last year that ICE may have deported 70 U.S. citizens in recent years. Because of ICE’s known aversion to record-keeping, there are likely more we don’t know about. Just this week, The Los Angeles Times reports that immigration officials are spying on most Americans “without the need for warrants and many times circumventing state privacy laws.”
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