Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has stuck again with the feared deportation of 18-year-old high school sophomore Mario Aguilar. Aguilar had enrolled in Connecticut’s Wilbur Cross High School last year and was arrested by ICE officers at a nearby courthouse, where he went to face charges after a traffic accident, CNN reported.
Aguilar went to court in Milford, Connecticut, to face the charges against him resulting from a car accident a month earlier in August. According to CNN, police had arrested him on suspicion of driving under the influence, operating a motor vehicle without a license, and failure to insure a private motor vehicle. He was released from custody on a promise to appear in court. But the student never got to appear in court, as he was in ICE custody moments after entering the courthouse on Sept. 10.
"Deportation officers arrested Mario Andres Aguilar-Castanon, an illegally-present citizen of Guatemala, at the Milford Superior Court for immigration violations," ICE spokesman John Mohan said in a statement. Mohan argued that the teenager was arrested by U.S. Border Patrol agents in March 2018 and was issued a notice to appear in immigration court before he was released from custody.
"He failed to appear in immigration court," Mohan said, a claim Aguilar's lawyers dispute, CNN reported. According to his lawyers, Aguilar was 16 when he came to the U.S. seeking asylum as an “unaccompanied minor.” The student was unaware of receiving any paperwork in regards to a court date.
Peers became worried when the principal announced ICE detained a student, a junior at the school Sandy Martinez-Paz said, and they wanted to know who it was. While cases like this have become frequent in this country, students and teachers at Wilbur Cross High School began fighting back when they heard of Aguilar’s arrest.
For days before the news was announced, students and teachers searched for Aguilar worried about his disappearance but not knowing of his arrest. Aguilar’s school counselor Mia Breuler searched for the student for days, knowing it was unlike him to miss so many classes and not show up for his job, CNN reported. Breuler contacted who she could, including police, who she told CNN, also did not know where he was. "One officer said to me, 'Are you sure he's not with a girlfriend or something?’”
Eventually, the counselor was led to call the Bristol County House of Corrections in North Dartmouth, Massachusetts, where officials confirmed Aguilar was being held. "It was shocking on all sorts of levels. It was very upsetting. I was anxiety-ridden because I was thinking, 'Now what do I do? ... Where do I go? ... Where do I begin to try to get help for this kid?’"
Unable to reach his family for weeks, Brueler told CNN, Aguilar called the school instead and spoke with her almost every day.
Teachers worked together to compile homework to send to Aguilar in ICE detention in order to ensure Aguilar would not fall behind in his work or feel forgotten. Attorney Dalia Fuleihan said she tried to send the homework to the Bristol County House of Corrections multiple times, first in an in-person meeting with her client, and then via mail after she was told she could only hand him legal paperwork.
Unfortunately, his homework was “refused” and returned to the sender with a handwritten note on the stamp that read, "Unknown name" and "ID# required." When asked why the homework was returned, an ICE spokesman said the agency doesn't comment on issues, claims, or allegations that "are not related to a detainee's enforcement status,” CNN reported.
But this still didn’t allow them to lose hope. They showed up to support him in court and even wrote letters pushing for his release. Spanish teacher Mary Perez Estrada attended Aguilar’s asylum hearing in Boston immigration court, where she said she hoped the judge would sympathize with Aguilar’s story of how he'd fled persecution from gangs in Guatemala but the judge didn't make a ruling that day. He told the court he'd announce his decision Dec. 12.
As they await the immigration judge’s ruling in his asylum case this week, students and supporters at the school get ready for another rally. Supporters fear for Aguilar’s safety should he be deported to Guatemala. According to CNN, ”Free Mario" protest posters were printed in the school's print shop, with stickers sold to raise money for his commissary. For weeks, peers even kept his desk open in classes, hoping for his return.
Now students have made a heartfelt video to share his story with others. While Gabriela Gonzalez did not know Mario before, the high school senior who studied film helped to make a movie to inform students about the case and its importance. "He wasn't known before, but now literally there's posters around the school with his face on it everywhere. People didn't know about him because he was just a regular student. ... But now the fact that just this ordinary student was taken, his whole life has been turned upside down because he happens to be from somewhere else, shows that this can happen to anyone," Gonzalez said. "And it shouldn't happen to anyone, because we're all just trying to live our lives as teenagers or normal, everyday people walking around the street."
This isn’t the first time ICE has detained a student. Last month news spread that 90 additional students of a fake university in Michigan were arrested in recent months. ICE created the University of Farmington, a fictitious school, to trap potential students who were interested in student visas. At least 600 students were impacted, of which about 250 have been arrested for immigration violations and faced deportation, the Detroit Free Press reported.
The students had arrived legally in the country on student visas, but after the university was revealed to be a creation of federal agents, they lost their immigration status once it shut down in January. Out of the 250 students arrested, "nearly 80% were granted voluntary departure and departed the United States," the Detroit office of ICE's Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) told the Detroit Free Press in a statement.