After ICE detained this migrant in Texas, her C-section scar ripped open and she was denied surgery

[TexasTowelie]

By Hannah Wiley, Texas Tribune


After ICE detained this migrant in Texas, her C-section scar ripped open and she was denied surgery for 4 months


In the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers where she was held, Luz became known as la llorona — the one who cries.

Luz, who asked to be identified only by her first name to protect her from an abusive husband in Honduras if she’s deported, said she was in emotional and physical pain for the five months she was in federal detention. First, she was separated from her 15-year-old son under the U.S. government’s short-lived “zero-tolerance” policy after fleeing what she described as 17 years of physical and emotional abuse — including death threats — from her husband and illegally crossing the Rio Grande on May 16.

They were quickly apprehended by Border Patrol agents near McAllen and requested asylum; Luz was sent to the Port Isabel Detention Center while her son was shipped to a San Antonio migrant youth shelter. Luz said she left her six other children in the care of her mother and other relatives in Honduras; her lawyer said she hoped to gain asylum and bring them to the United States to join her.

Then, within a week of arriving at Port Isabel, Luz said her umbilical hernia and Cesarean section scar — the aftermath of delivering her seventh child in March 2017 — ripped open.

Read more: https://www.texastribune.org/2018/10/26/migrant-mother-denied-surgery-scar-ice-detention/