The American Civil Liberties Union is suing the federal government to release a 10-year-old girl with cerebral palsy who has been detained by federal immigration authorities in Texas, NPR reports.
Border Patrol agents took Rosamaria Hernandez into custody last Tuesday after she passed through a checkpoint on her way to a hospital for emergency gallbladder surgery. She was being transferred from a medical center in Laredo, Texas, to a hospital in Corpus Christi when agents stopped the ambulance she was riding in.
She was allowed to get to Driscoll Children's Hospital in Corpus Christi to undergo the surgery, but the agents took her to a children's shelter and started deportation proceedings.
"Rosa Maria is being taken care of by strangers," says Michael Tan, an ACLU lawyer who is representing Hernandez. "Imagine sending your child to the hospital for surgery, only to have law enforcement sweep in and take them away from you."
A Health and Human Services spokeswoman would not give NPR a direct answer as to whether its youth shelters are set up to handle medical cases like Hernandez's.
"As a matter of policy, in order to protect the privacy and security of the unaccompanied alien children . . . HHS does not identify individual UAC and will not comment on specific cases," Victoria Palmer said.
Gabriel Acosta, assistant chief patrol agent in Laredo, said Hernandez was taken to the shelter because they deemed her an unaccompanied alien child as she was not traveling with a parent or legal guardian.
"A line agent always has discretion to exercise his judgment and not target someone for an enforcement action," Tan said. "And this case is the best possible example you could imagine for prosecutorial discretion. There really is no reason for Border Patrol to have gone after a 10-year-old girl with cerebral palsy while she was seeking medical care."
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