Leticia Casillas Luquin:  A Student’s Experience Helping Immigrants in Need at ProBAR

The South Texas Pro Bono Asylum Representation Project (ProBAR) is a project under the umbrella of the American Bar Association.  ProBAR is the only organization in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas providing pro bono assistance to detained immigrants and asylum seekers in the region.  ProBAR primarily helps detainees in the Port Isabel Detention Center and East Hidalgo Detention Center, as well as several children shelters in the surrounding area.  Private attorneys also provide free legal services.  Among the generous attorneys is Jody Goodwin, recipient of the Michael Maggio Memorial ProBono Award by the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

As a legal intern at ProBAR this past summer, I was able to work with a supportive and passionate team.  I worked alongside Natalia Mead, an intern from the American University Washington College of Law, and under the supervision of Natalie Caldwalader, an Equal Justice Fellow.  The current political climate increased the demand for legal services and the needs of detainees and asylum seekers for representation.  There was a new procedure in Rio Grande Valley adopted by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to identify age for unaccompanied minors.

ProBAR learned about unaccompanied minors (UC) being placed in Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE) detention centers for adults through (1) calls from the detainee’s family members; and (2) word of mouth from detainees in the detention center.  As a result of UCs being placed in adult detention centers instead of shelters, many lost protections for child migrants under the Flores Settlement Agreement and the Trafficking Victims Protections Reauthorization Act (TVPRA).  While I was there, our team encountered three children who claimed to have been coerced by CBP officers to say that they were adults.

Our team collaborated with Catholic Legal Immigration Network Inc. (CLINIC) and the Innocence Project to present a webinar on the best practices guide for attorneys who work with UCs.

As an intern, I researched procedural practices for CBP and coercion.  Most of my research suggests that the primary reason that UCs produce false statements is because children are more susceptible to coercion than adults.  The pressure of being detained, as well as the conditions at the detention centers, make it more likely for children to give into the demands of an interrogator.  The following are examples of UCs reports about questioning in ICE custody.

• Allegations by CBP officers that the UC was lying or being questioned about the validity of their documents.
• Non-Spanish and non-English speaking UCs were transferred directly without confirming the UCs age. CBP officers instead would estimate their age by examining their physical appearance.
• Threats by CBP officers that the UC would be put in jail for several years if he or she did not admit to being an adult. 

I observed that CBP officer’s actions adversely affect UCs’ legal outcomes, as well as their psychological well-being.  

If the federal government designates a UC to be an adult, the child will be transferred to an ICE detention facility with adverse mental health consequences, including anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder.  See M. von Werthern, The Impact of Immigration Detention Mental Health: A Systematic Review, BMC Psychiatry 1 (2018).  The UCs who our team met experienced stress and were anxious to reunite with their family members.

The excessive discretion of CBP and ICE harms minors and requires more equitable assessments of whether an unaccompanied minor is indeed a minor, especially in situations where the UCs speak a different language than the ICE officer.  Currently, minors are incorrectly placed in adult detention centers and losing their legal protections under the TVPRA and the Flores Settlement Agreement.  Examples include the following:  (1) no cost voluntary departure; (2) eligibility for Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SIJS); (3) avoidance of expedited removal; and (4) the right to seek asylum in a non-adversarial interview with USCIS.  It is also important to emphasize that, when “accidently” placed in detention centers, UCs suffer psychological harm and prevent UC from acquiring a fair hearing before an immigration judge or having the opportunity to be housed at a shelter.

________________________________________________________ 

Leticia Casillas Luquin is a second year law student at UC Davis School of Law.

KJ