Thread: Cowardly Mexican criminal hides behind anchor baby

Cowardly Mexican criminal hides behind anchor baby

Mom banks on native son to avoid deportation

August 23, 2006

BY ESTHER J. CEPEDA Staff Reporter

A week after taking sanctuary in a Humboldt Park church, Elvira Arellano is hoping her 7-year-old son will be the key to stopping her deportation.

A petition expected to be filed in federal court this week argues that because Arellano and her son, Saul, have no blood relatives living in the U.S. who could care for the boy if Elvira Arellano is deported to her native Mexico, the government in effect would be deporting the U.S.-born second-grader.

The petition, being filed in Saul's name, will ask a judge to force the Department of Homeland Security to vacate the deportation order against Arellano, who admits entering the country illegally but says she wants to stay so her son has a better life.

"If he had to go to Mexico because his mother was deported, it would violate his due process rights under the law," said Joseph Mathews, an attorney representing Arellano pro bono. "And if you violate Saul's rights, you violate the rights of all people born on U.S. soil."

This filing might be the first of its kind, said Mathews. But there are similar ones.

Similar case failed on appeal

In a New York case, a man originally from Trinidad, Don Beharry, was convicted of robbing a coffee shop, and immigration authorities began deportation proceedings. Beharry, though, argued that being kicked out of the country would cause an unfair hardship for his 6-year-old U.S. citizen daughter.

Although a judge ruled in Beharry's favor, it was overturned on appeal, noted Susan Gzesh of the Human Rights Program at the University of Chicago. She said that, in a situation like Arellano's, "you have to raise novel and creative approaches."

There's concern by some that, if successful, Arellano's new legal maneuver could open a floodgate of litigation on behalf of so-called "anchor babies." But not everyone thinks it will get very far.

"I'm very sympathetic and I applaud the fact someone is making a claim like this, but I just don't think there's any traction," said attorney Cyrus D. Mehta, past chairman of the American Immigration Law Foundation.

Arellano, 31, moved into a cramped room above Adalberto United Methodist Church with her son last Tuesday claiming sanctuary to avoid deportation.

Arellano is ineligible for citizenship because of a conviction for working under someone else's Social Security number.

ecepeda@suntimes.com

Arellano is ineligible for citizenship because of a conviction for working under someone else's Social Security number.

Plus she had been deported before and came back.

Where is the link to this article please?

So now are we to assume she can't be deported due to a pending court case involving her?

A petition expected to be filed in federal court this week argues that because Arellano and her son, Saul, have no blood relatives living in the U.S. who could care for the boy if Elvira Arellano is deported to her native Mexico, the government in effect would be deporting the U.S.-born second-grader.

Good thing I'm not a judge. I'd give them 2 choices.

A: A minor child with a single parent who is a convicted felon and fugitive who is already looking at prison time and nobody to care for him makes him a ward of the state and he goes into foster care.

B: The kid goes with his mom.