Grandmother must return to Liberia
Immigration law sending her away from her family
Thursday, January 7, 2010 3:21 AM
By Todd Jones



Bernice and Sunny Bryant hug on one of Bernice's last nights in the United States, at least for the foreseeable future. She is being deported today because of an expired visa in 1986.



Bernice Bryant packs with the help of friend Nancy Fiamahn as her husband, Sunny, and sister-in-law Cleo Bryant watch. Bernice Bryant is to return to Liberia today.

The gray complexity of an individual's life doesn't always mesh with the inflexible, black-and-white world of U.S. immigration laws.

So a grandmother will board a plane today, leave her family in central Ohio and return to live in her native Liberia with no certainty of being permitted to enter the United States again for at least 10 years.

Bernice Bryant fears moving back to her war-ravaged homeland of Liberia after living openly in the U.S. since 1983. She has lived the past 20 years in Columbus -- while unknowingly being considered a fugitive alien by the U.S. government.

She has paid taxes here; been granted work permits, a driver's license and Social Security card; and grown used to comforts mostly unknown in the poverty-stricken country in western Africa that she last saw 27 years ago.

"This is not like every immigrant's story," said Bryant's attorney, Ken Robinson, "but it should serve as a signal to the rest of us that our immigration system is fundamentally flawed. I wish that this was a unique experience, but this experience is being repeated in all 50 states, and probably every day."

His client has been married for 13 years to Sunny Bryant, a Liberian who was granted U.S. citizenship in 2004. The couple has a son, Winston, a U.S. citizen. He turns 14 on Jan. 19 and, like his father, will remain in Columbus.

"This is my home," said Bernice Bryant, who has three adult children from an earlier marriage, and a 1-year-old granddaughter living in Columbus. "Liberia is my birthplace, but I don't want to live there the rest of my life. I built my home here. I have friends and family here. I want to be here."

Bryant is leaving her Far East Side home for a country where the unemployment rate is 85 percent and crime remains rampant after 14 years of civil war. Her quest to gain permanent legal status here backfired three years ago.

An appearance at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office Downtown caused officials to realize that Bryant had been ordered deported in 1986 because her temporary visa had expired.

The discovery initially landed Bryant in a Kentucky jail. As reported in a Dispatch series in 2007, she was released after 102 days, but a Detroit immigration judge subsequently refused to reopen Bryant's immigration case.

Bryant could have been arrested again at any time after the judge's order. Instead, the government allowed her to remain free with conditions: She had to make monthly checks with immigration officials, stay in Ohio, abide by state and federal laws, and apply for a passport and travel documents with the Liberian consulate.

Liberia granted Bryant, 47, a passport this past September, and the U.S. government ordered her to leave the country by today.

"I'm not bitterly angry at the U.S., but I'm disappointed," said Sunny Bryant, who will accompany his wife to Liberia and remain there until the end of January.

Immigration officials had no comment on the case this week but have said in the past that they are following orders.

"Our job in immigration and customs is to enforce, to carry out, a judge's order," ICE spokesperson Greg Palmore said in August 2007. "In this case, we're responsible for removing this person from the United States."

Bryant might have been able to avoid deportation today had she in 1986 immediately appealed the denial of her request for political asylum. She later mistakenly thought she had temporary legal status because she was granted work permits and had married a U.S. citizen.

"This is not a case of evil ICE officers or an evil immigration office or an evil immigration judge," Robinson said. "This is about the draconian laws that do not provide for any flexibility or allowance for the exercise of discretion or leniency by government officials to choose to keep her here. The government doesn't have a choice by law."

The immigration system's inflexibility showed in fiscal year 2008, when the government deported a one-year record 369,048 illegal immigrants, including about 8,000 from Ohio and Michigan.

A Homeland Security subcommittee report released last April showed that of those nearly 370,000 deported, fewer than one-third had been convicted of a crime other than their immigration charge.

A data analysis by Syracuse University showed that since 2000, more than 80 percent of people charged in immigration court had been charged only with their immigration violation. Of those, one-third had lawfully entered the U.S. but, like Bryant, overstayed their visa.

Because she didn't leave in 1986 as ordered, Bryant won't be eligible for a visa to re-enter the United States for 10 years, although Robinson has begun an appeal in hopes that his client can return to the U.S. in about one year.

Meanwhile, Bryant will move in with her sister's family in Monrovia, the nation's capital of nearly 1 million. She'll be one of 10 people living in a four-bedroom house that has no electricity or running water.

Liberia has struggled to rebuild since its civil war ended seven years ago. The war left 200,000 Liberians dead and displaced 1 million.

A United Nations report last year found that more than three-quarters of the population lives on less than $1 a day. Forty-three percent of the country's population of 3.4 million is illiterate, and the life expectancy is 42 years.

Despite democratic elections in October 2005, the threat of violence looms. Tens of thousands of ex-combatants roam the countryside, and 12,000 U.N. peacekeeping forces are in Liberia.

"I don't think it's safe there," Bernice Bryant said. "It's scary."

After helping his wife settle in Liberia, Sunny Bryant plans to return to Columbus because his only means of supporting the family is with his business, Sunny's Driving Academy.

Bills are piling up. The two plane tickets to Liberia cost $5,000, and Sunny might have to sell their house because he is three months behind on his mortgage.

"I'm done crying," Bernice Bryant said.

tjones@dispatch.com


http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/lo ... ml?sid=101