Wrong turn at Ambassador Bridge exit leads to detention for Detroit immigrant mom, kids

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• An immigrant mother and her two young daughters were detained by federal immigrants agents at the Ambassador Bridge in Detroit, her attorney said.
• Immigrant advocates say immigrants are being held in a facility in Detroit near the Ambassador Bridge entrance.

It’s a mistake many drivers have made while traveling on I-75 through southwest Detroit: accidentally taking the exit that leads you to the entrance of the Ambassador Bridge to Canada. For U.S. citizens, it can cause some temporary challenges as they are checked by border security and then usually allowed to head back to the Detroit side of the international border.

But for an immigrant mother in southwest Detroit whose family took the wrong exit off Interstate 75 leading to the bridge while on their way to Costco, the mistake led to the family being detained by immigration agents for several days, including her two daughters, who are U.S. citizens, and a brother, her attorney said. It was an ordeal that advocates say reveals that federal agents have set up a facility in Detroit near the bridge to temporarily house immigrant detainees. And they worry more cases like this could happen as the administration of President Donald Trump ramps up immigration enforcement.

She felt like she “was kidnapped,” said her lawyer, Ruby Robinson, senior managing attorney with the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center.

For five days, the woman, born in Guatemala, and her family were stuck in a detention center, confused and scared about what was happening to them and where they were, and unable to get access to a lawyer. They had to live in a cold room subsiding on instant noodle soups, and one of her children came down with a fever while detained, according to the attorney. The woman, who goes by the name Sarahi, was detained on March 8 and not released along with her daughters, ages 1 and 5, until March 12. Sarahi’s brother, age 19, is still in detention. Federal authorities say she was an “illegal alien” who had crossed into the U.S. without authorization in 2018.

In the past, it was unlikely families would be detained like Sarahi was, but since January 20, when Trump became president for a second term, things have changed, Robinson said.

Before Trump became president again in January, “if it is a family with children, regardless of the immigration status of the children, the family most likely would have been released, or at least one adult would have been released with the kids, because the United States does not really do family detention,” Robinson explained Friday to the Free Press. “They should not be doing family detention.”

Previously, families like this would have been given a court hearing and some conditions for their release. But in this case, “what happened now is that instead of that occurring right away, she had to remain in this short term detention space for five days with her children … not knowing what was going to be happening, if she was going to be deported, if that was the last night she was going to see her children,” Robinson said. “And so that is really concerning on the short term detention spaces being used for longer periods of time.”

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said the woman had violated immigration laws, which means they had the right to detain and remove her.

“She admitted to unlawfully entering the U.S. in 2018,” CBP Assistant Commissioner Hilton Beckham said in a statement to the Free Press, released by a spokesman for CBP in Michigan.

“When individuals violate immigration laws, their choices make them subject to detention and removal,” Beckham added. “In this case, an illegal alien was encountered at the Detroit Ambassador Bridge after driving into Canada without travel documents.”

Beckham blamed her long detention on the fact that she did not want to be separated from her children while in custody. The woman detained had expressed concern about being separated from her children.

“Per policy, CBP worked to find a suitable guardian for her U.S. citizen children; however, she initially chose to keep them with her, prolonging the detention period,” Beckham said. “Once the children were placed with a guardian, she was transferred to ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement).”

Trip to Costco goes awry

It was on a Saturday, March 8, when Sarahi and her family decided to head to Costco for some weekend shopping. They searched on the Internet for the closest Costco to their home in southwest Detroit and the directions through their GPS led them to a store in Windsor, Canada, which is across the river from Detroit.

“They put Costco into the GPS and they follow the GPS,” Robinson said. “But unfortunately, the GPS was leading them to Costco in Windsor, which is … as the crow flies, the closest Costco to where they were in southwest Detroit. GPS doesn’t know that it’s not a good idea to go towards the bridge.”

For years, immigrants accidentally entering the bridge or tunnel to Canada has been common, Robinson and other advocates said.

“We hear stories every week from people in detention who mistakenly drive on to the Ambassador Bridge,” Robinson said. “And if you’re an adult and you do that by mistake, and you’re deportable from the United States, there is a very good chance that you will be detained and placed in removal proceedings. … That’s been happening as long as I’ve been practicing immigration law.”

But now, immigrants could face detention for long periods of time. It’s unclear where exactly in Detroit the detention center Sarahi was placed in is located.

Sarahi’s case was first reported by NPR. She told the radio station she was handcuffed and screamed at by agents at one point. Sarahi said she didn’t want to give her full name out of fear of retaliation.

“They told me I could call someone to pick (the children) up, but at that moment I did not want to let go of them,” she told NPR. “I felt I’d lost my head. Some of the agents were nice, others screamed at me when I was giving them my fingerprints. I was so scared, my hand was shaking. I was not well.”

More: She told Michigan cops she was attacked. Now she faces deportation by the feds

A couple of days after her detention, her daughters started to get sick, one developing a fever, the other a cough. She said she didn’t receive medication for them and asked the CBP officers to let her children go.

“I told them please, they are getting sick,” she said.

Sarahi said they eventually made her sign a document saying she had entered the U.S. without authorization and she wanted her daughter to stay with her. She was eventually released with her kids on the night of March 12 to her sister-in-law, who picked them up. She saw her brother once during their detention, handcuffed and in shackles.

Sarahi has a court hearing in June in Detroit immigration court and could possibly face deportation to Guatemala. Immigrant advocates say that the center where she was held doesn’t meet the federal standards for housing detainees and allowing access to attorneys.

Some also worry about the trauma that young kids may face in situations like this.

“This is something that a five year old would remember,” Robinson said. “The child saw at one point during the week, on Wednesday … they saw their uncle in handcuffs, and that was tremendously traumatizing on top of everything else. So thankfully she’s out, thankfully she’s with her kids. But this journey is not over, and ultimately may not end well, but at least she’ll be with her children and they can figure this out together, instead of isolated and by herself.”

Contact Niraj Warikoo: [email protected] or X @nwarikoo