Activists rallied at the Otay Mesa Detention Center for an undocumented woman who was recently taken into custody who has no criminal record and was a “collateral” arrest, reports NBC 7’s Shelby Bremer.
Protesters rallied outside Otay Mesa Detention Center on Thursday in support of an undocumented woman without a criminal record who was taken into custody last week and put into deportation proceedings as her daughter battles cancer.
Yolanda Magellón Perez was taken into custody on Feb. 24 outside her home in El Monte, California. Her attorney, David Acalin, said ICE agents were waiting for her son, who had been convicted of a nonviolent crime years ago.
“ICE came out of their vehicles, detained him, and arrested him. The family saw what was going on. They went outside to challenge ICE,” Acalin said. “Yolanda said, you know, ‘What are you doing to my son?’ And in return for her saying that, they handcuffed her and took her into custody.”
ICE has not responded to NBC 7's request for comment or further information on Perez’s case. Acalin said she has been in the U.S. for more than 20 years and is the primary caregiver for her daughter, Xitlali Tejeda, who’s battling cancer.
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“She means everything to me. She’s like my right hand,” Tejeda said outside the detention center Thursday.
“She cooks for me. She does everything for me. Changes me. She showers me. She’s there for me. She doesn’t leave me alone,” she continued through tears. “If I’m in the living room, she comes with me. If I’m in the room, she lays with me. She just never leaves my side.”
Tejeda traveled from Los Angeles County to San Diego on Thursday morning for Perez’s hearing before an immigration judge at the detention center, but the proceedings lasted just a few minutes and were over before Tejeda made it inside.
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Acalin said he filed a request for a hearing to determine if Perez could be released on bond. The judge scheduled the next hearing in her case for March 20, with that bond hearing to be held sometime in the interim.
Wearing a blue detainee jumpsuit in the courtroom, Perez cried as Acalin explained her situation to the judge.
“It's literally a life and death situation,” Acalin said. “The daughter is gravely ill. She needs the mother as her full-time caretaker to take her to her doctors, to the treatments.”
Acalin said Perez’s son who was taken into custody was also the family’s primary breadwinner. He said he’s taken on many new clients since President Donald Trump took office in January and moved swiftly to heighten immigration enforcement and fulfill his campaign promise of mass deportations.
Administration officials have said they would target individuals with violent criminal convictions but have also noted there would be collateral arrests, particularly in jurisdictions where local law enforcement does not assist ICE.
“The pretense that they are going after people that are national security risks or dangers to society – I will tell you, I've signed up a lot of deportation cases since the new administration began and not one of them has been a violent criminal, not one of those a national security risk," Acalin said.
“They keep saying that they're going to detain criminals. Yolanda is not a criminal,” said activist Ana Garcia, one of a handful of demonstrators outside the detention center Thursday. “She's a law abiding citizen. She takes care of her daughter. She works hard. She's a good member of the community.”
“Xitlali is fighting for her life,” she continued. “She shouldn't be fighting for her mother to be released when her mother didn't do anything.”
Tejeda said in her mother’s absence, other members of her family are taking turns caring for her.
“It just sucks because they’re taking their days off, losing money to come watch me,” she said. “When I had my mom, when I had her right next to me, it just, it’s not the same. It’s not the same care.”
Tejeda said neither she nor Perez have slept or eaten well since the arrest. Though she didn’t make it to the hearing, the two were able to do a video visit, with some hope that the judge may let Perez out on bond in the coming weeks.
“I just hope they could find it in their hearts to just let her go and be with me,” Tejeda said.
