A ten year old illegal immigrant whose arrest by the Border Patrol while in an ambulance taking her to the hospital for surgery, has been released from Border Patrol custody, despite a federal court''s refusal to order her release, News Radio 1200 WOAI reports.
"Rosa Maria is finally free, and we are excited that she can go home to heal, surrounded by her family's love and support," said ACLU attorney Michael Tan.."But despite our relief, Border Patrol's decision to target a young girl at a children's hospital remains unconscionable.. No child should go through this trauma."
Rosa Maria Hernandez, who entered the U.S. illegally with her parents as a child and is not covered by the DACA program, suffers from cerebral palsy.. She was being rushed by ambulance from her home in Laredo to a hospital in Corpus Christi when she was stopped at the Border Patrol checkpoint in Freer.. When agents determined she is an illegal immigrant, a Border Patrol vehicle and four agents followed her ambulance to the hospital and waited during her surgery and recovery, and took her into custody when she was released.
She had been held at a shelter for undocumented immigrants in San Antonio until her release late Friday.
Rosa Maria was the subject of renewed outrage by immigrant right activists over what they see as unfair enforcement of immigration laws by the Trump Administration.
"Rosa Maria should not have been detained for even a second, said Andre Segura, legal director of the ACLU in Texas.
But the court fight on behalf of Rosa Maria also resulted in a brutal legal slap-down for the open-border advocates.
On Thursday, a San Antonio federal judge who had been asked to schedule a hearing in her case, responded that the girl is in the U.S. illegally, and said the laws don't allow the courts to selectively enforce immigration requirements.
To immigration right groups that constantly complain about 'breaking up families,' U.S. District Judge Fred Biery suggested that Rosa Maria's mother be arrested and deported too, 'and then the family could be reunited in their home country.'
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