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Order to deport teen lifted — for now
Jail stints inspire immigrant, lawyer to help others

By JENNIFER JACOBS
REGISTER STAFF WRITER


June 27, 2006

Jim Benzoni, locked in jail for a double murder he had nothing to do with, had an epiphany: If the justice system worked and he regained his freedom, he would become a lawyer and fight for the poor and the oppressed.

Within a month, he had passed his law school admission exam and was off to Drake University in Des Moines.

Twenty years later, 18-year-old Estephanie Izaguirre found herself locked in jail in Des Moines for illegally sneaking into the United States at age 12 to escape a dead-end life in Honduras. She had her own epiphany. She told her lawyer, Jim Benzoni, that if she was deported to her homeland, she would use it as an opportunity to aid other children in similar circumstances: living in such poverty that they turn to prostitution to earn money.

On Monday, Benzoni telephoned her with news: An immigration judge had rescinded her deportation order. That means she's no longer under immediate threat of being put on an airplane with a one-way ticket to Honduras.

But she's still not a legal resident of the United States, and she might never be.

"Her case is back to square one," Benzoni said. "It allows everyone to take a step back and take a breather and say, 'How do we handle this?' Now it's a question of what relief is she eligible for?"

For Izaguirre, the judge's order is a big deal. She was cleaning the house when Benzoni called. When she later heard his message, that the deportation was "totally erased, as if it never was," she was overjoyed. "I was screaming," she said.

Benzoni guesses there's a 60 percent chance that all her legal requests will be denied and she'll "end up back in Honduras, dropped on her head."

"My reading of Estephanie is that she's got a 90 percent chance of landing on her feet, no matter what happens, because that's the kind of person she is," he said. "If she stays or goes, she's going to be doing something good."

It could take up to a year to get her immigration status sorted out.

Izaguirre has already contacted I Make A Difference, whose mission is to free women and children from sex traffickers. It's run by Sylvia DeWitt of Van Meter, Ia., and the group's current project is in Mumbai, India.

Izaguirre also volunteered for Latinos Unidos in Des Moines.

"It's not like she's desperate to stay in the United States so she can go to Jordan Creek mall and go shopping," Benzoni said. "She's an unusually thoughtful person. I don't get clients like her very often."

Benzoni was 31 when he lived through an example that "the government can make mistakes," he said.

In 1986, Benzoni was a vegetarian hippie hitchhiking across the country promoting nonviolence and his deep belief in God. A day after he passed through Guymon, a small town in western Oklahoma, an Iowa couple were murdered there in their pickup camper.

Benzoni had stopped by the Guymon police station for a church-sponsored voucher for food. The police wouldn't issue him a $5 chit for the local deli because he didn't have an official state photo ID, but they later issued two warrants for his arrest for first-degree murder.

He was handcuffed at a California telephone booth.

"It was like being in the Twilight Zone," said Benzoni, now 51. "I was really, really angry, which is different from being afraid. I'm not saying there wasn't fear there, but it was more like, 'What the hell?' "

During his four months in an Oklahoma jail, priests from his seminary days called to assure police of his good character. But law enforcement officials were so certain they'd nabbed the killer that they returned the camper - with its fingerprints and hair samples - back to the family.

In the end, a hard-working court-appointed attorney proved Benzoni's innocence by locating two truck drivers who verified his alibi.

"I said, 'God, whatever door you open from now on, I'm going to walk through it,' " he said. "Only a few people wake up to the call to be of service, but everybody has that call.

"It's like with Estephanie. You realize you need to do the work you're given to do, and what you need will come to you."