Benjamin Guerrero-Cruz’s household was shocked and heartbroken when the 18-year-old was grabbed by immigration brokers whereas strolling his canine in Van Nuys simply days earlier than he was set to start out his senior yr at Reseda Constitution Excessive Faculty.
This week, his household was caught off-guard as soon as once more after they discovered that Immigration and Customs Enforcement had transferred him to Arizona with out notifying any kinfolk, in response to the workplace of U.S. Rep. Luz Rivas (D-North Hollywood), which spoke to his household and reviewed ICE detention information.
Guerrero-Cruz was moved out of the Adelanto Detention Facility in San Bernardino County late Monday night time and brought to a holding facility in Arizona in the midst of the desert, in response to the congresswoman’s workplace.
On Tuesday night time, he was scheduled to be transferred to Louisiana, a main hub for deportation flights, however on the final minute he was taken off the aircraft and despatched again to Adelanto, the place he’s presently being held.
“Benjamin and his household deserve solutions behind ICE’s inconsistent and chaotic decision-making course of, together with why Benjamin was initially transferred to Arizona, why he was slated to be transferred to Louisiana afterward, and why his household wasn’t notified of his whereabouts by ICE all through this course of,” Rivas mentioned in an announcement.
On Tuesday, Rivas launched a invoice that might require ICE to inform a right away member of the family of a detainee inside 24 hours of a detainee’s switch. Presently, ICE is required to inform a member of the family solely within the case of a detainee’s loss of life.
“Benjamin’s story of being detained and despatched throughout state traces with out warning or notification is like many different detainees in Los Angeles and throughout the nation,” Rivas mentioned. “Many immigrant households in my district have no idea the whereabouts of their family members after they’re detained by ICE.”
The Division of Homeland Safety didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark. The company beforehand acknowledged that Guerrero-Cruz was awaiting deportation to Chile after overstaying his visa, which required him to depart america on March 15, 2023.
Benjamin Guerrero-Cruz, proven at college, is an avid soccer participant and loving older brother, in response to his household.
(Rita Silva)
Guerrero-Cruz was arrested Aug. 8 and held in downtown L.A. for every week, throughout which period he was briefly taken on an unexplained journey to a detention heart in Santa Ana earlier than being transferred to Adelanto on Aug. 15, in response to a former instructor who visited him in custody.
His expertise of being pingponged round completely different amenities is frequent amongst these being detained in what the Trump administration is billing as the biggest deportation effort in American historical past.
This pattern can also be mirrored in ICE’s flight information. The company carried out 2,022 home switch flights from Might by means of July — representing a 90% enhance from the identical interval final yr, in response to a extensively cited database of flights created by immigrant rights advocate Tom Cartwright.
Cartwright posited in his July report that this uptick may very well be associated to a “have to optimize mattress house as detention numbers have ballooned from 39,152 on 29 December to 56,945 on 26 July.”
Jorge-Mario Cabrera, spokesperson for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights L.A., referred to as the Trump administration’s detention insurance policies merciless, saying it seems that they’re detaining individuals for so long as attainable and “transferring them from place to position for no motive apart from as a result of they’ll.”
“The truth that these dumbfounding transfers in the midst of the night time trigger chaos, confusion, and minimizes entry to authorized illustration doesn’t appear to hassle them one bit,” he mentioned in an announcement.
Susham M. Modi, an immigration lawyer based mostly in Houston, mentioned he had witnessed an uptick within the frequency of transfers amongst these lately detained by ICE.
“[Detainees are] additionally being typically transferred to the place there’s much less attorneys,” he mentioned. “I’ve seen consults the place they’ve been transferred to Oklahoma, the place it is extremely onerous to seek out an lawyer which may do, for instance, federal court docket litigation.”
Though households can use ICE’s On-line Detainee Locator to seek for family members, it isn’t all the time updated, and a few households have no idea the way to use it, Modi mentioned. When detainees are transferred, they typically can’t make outgoing calls from the detention facility till somebody has deposited cash into their account — one other hurdle for conserving relations up to date on their whereabouts, he added.
