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A family deported to Mexico while seeking brain cancer treatment for their 10-year-old daughter in Texas has requested an investigation into alleged abuses they claim they faced while in U.S. Customs and Border Protection custody last month.
According to a civil rights complaint first obtained by NBC News, the family alleges law enforcement committed “serious abuses” when it denied medical care to the 10-year-old girl, who is a U.S. citizen. The mixed-status family also alleges they were detained “in deplorable conditions” before being removed to Mexico, where they say some of their children’s lives “are in peril because of their status as U.S. citizens.”
On Feb. 3, the family was stopped by CBP officials at an immigration checkpoint in Texas while they were traveling to an emergency medical appointment for their 10-year-old daughter. During prior trips, the girl's undocumented parents were allowed through the checkpoint after presenting authorities with letters from their daughter’s doctors and lawyers. But this time, the parents were told those letters were insufficient.
Immigration authorities arrested the parents after they were unable to show legal immigration documentation. The family’s attorney, Daniel Woodward, said the parents have “no criminal history” and were in the process of obtaining T visas, a temporary immigration benefit for victims of human trafficking. The girl’s mother told NBC News they arrived in the U.S. from Mexico in 2013 and settled in Texas hoping for “a better life for the family.”
In addition to the couple’s 10-year-old daughter, four of their children, ages 15, 13, 8 and 6 — three of whom are U.S. citizens — were with them when they were arrested. Following their arrest, the parents and their five children were taken to a detention facility. They were loaded on a van 24 hours later and dropped on the Mexico side of a bridge.
The Texas Civil Rights Project, a legal advocacy and litigation organization representing the family, filed the complaint Monday with the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties.
The 10-year-old isn’t the only member of the family who is being treated for a medical condition. The couple’s 15-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter both have a serious medical condition, a heart disorder, known as Long QT syndrome, that causes irregular heartbeats and can be life-threatening without proper treatment.
In the complaint, the family alleges CBP’s medical team knew it had custody of “three children with complex medical needs, one of whom was complaining of urgent and serious symptoms.” Despite that, authorities failed to transfer the children to a medical facility “to obtain pediatric medical review.” The complaint alleges this was in violation of the Flores Settlement Agreement, which regulates how minors must be treated in federal immigration custody.
“Twelve hours earlier, [the 10-year-old girl’s] parents were so worried about her that they rushed the family towards Houston for emergency care. Instead of granting her that care, CBP forced a child who was still recovering from brain surgery to sleep in a hot, dirty, brightly lit cell,” the complaint reads.
The document alleges the children were inappropriately searched during their detention: “Officers searched each member of the family, including the pat downs of sensitive parts of their bodies. [The] six-year-old … a U.S. citizen, later asked his mom why they touched him ‘down there.’”
“Instead of granting her that care, CBP forced a child who was still recovering from brain surgery to sleep in a hot, dirty, brightly lit cell,” the complaint read.
The complaint also alleges that authorities denied the family adequate access to their attorney and threatened them with permanent separation unless the parents signed the deportation order. “One officer threatened that the government would take away her children and she would never speak to them again,” the complaint alleges.
In a statement, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson called reports of the family’s situation “inaccurate,” because when “someone is given expedited removal orders and chooses to disregard them, they will face the consequences.”
According to the 10-year-old girl’s mother, since the family was deported last month, her daughter has been unable to access the follow-up care she needs. The girl still suffers from swelling in her brain and difficulties with speech and mobility on the right side of her body.
The mother also told NBC News that all of her children are unable to sleep due to concerns about their safety, having been deported to an area of Mexico where U.S. citizens are often kidnapped.