Tuesday, August 7, 2007

Pedro Guzman, Welcome Home!

According to an AP story, Pedro Guzman
"ate out of garbage cans, bathed in rivers and was repeatedly turned away by U.S. border agents when he tried to return to California, his family said Tuesday. Pedro Guzman, 29, was picked up at the Calexico border crossing over the weekend and released to his family on Tuesday. Guzman was shaking, stuttering and appeared traumatized, his family said at a news conference. The family said it planned to seek medical attention for Guzman, who was not at the news conference. 'They took him whole, but only returned half of him to me,' his mother, Maria Carbajal, said in Spanish while crying. 'The government is responsible for this.'"

He apparently had several encounters with border guards but despite the Department of Homeland Security alert to be looking for Guzman and allow him entry, he had been turned away from his homeland on several occasions.

There still is no clear narrative from Guzman about what exactly happened during his deportation interview. I'll be posting more on this tomorrow.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not good for the Guzman family. But if this nation has 12-15mm illegal hispanic and latino immigrants in the country, this is bound to happen. An unfortunate but not unforgivable error.

Anonymous said...

I wonder if the same assumption of illegality and protocol would have been followed if the last name was Thrischler or Smith.

jacqueline stevens said...

Hi Stephen, I agree! How about we solve the problem by making everyone legal? JS