Post by rosa on Jan 31, 2009 13:06:45 GMT -7
I still have not heard or read of an adequate reason as to why this man, who appealed for asylum, was separated from his son and detained
This is from the local paper
Reporter from Mexico held by ICE is released
By Daniel Borunda / El Paso Times
Posted: 01/31/2009 12:00:00 AM MST
El PASO -- A Mexican newspaper reporter seeking political asylum in the U.S. because he feared for his life has been released after being held for seven months at an immigration detention center in El Paso.
"I could not believe it," Emilio Gutiérrez Soto said Friday after being unexpectedly released Thursday afternoon by immigration officials.
Several immigrant-rights groups and journalist associations, including the international press freedom group Reporters Without Borders, had asked that Gutiérrez be freed and that Mexican authorities investigate his claims.
"It was a shock," said Gutiérrez's lawyer, Carlos Spector. "I can really attribute it to a change in politics. ... The Obama administration's advent, I think, really sent a message to the local bureaucrats."
Gutiérrez, 46, is considered a parolee. His immigration case is pending, Spector said, and a hearing is possibly set for June.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Leticia Zamarripa said that it is ICE policy not to discuss individual immigration cases.
Gutiérrez, who wrote for El Diario del Noroeste in Ascension, Chihuahua, claims Mexican army officials targeted him after he wrote about allegations of crimes committed by soldiers in communities in the rural northwestern part of Chihuahua state.
Gutiérrez filed a complaint with Mexico's National Commission on Human Rights but said nothing was solved. On May 5, 2008, soldiers raided and searched his home after supposedly getting an anonymous tip that drugs and weapons were inside.
After being warned by a friend that the army was going to kill him, Gutiérrez fled to the U.S. with his 15-year-old son. He asked for asylum on June 16 at the border crossing at Antelope Wells, N.M.
Gutiérrez has been reunited with his son, who was released late last year from an immigration detention center for juveniles. His son had been staying with relatives in the El Paso region while Gutiérrez was detained.
"All journalists are having liberties curtailed in Mexico in part by organized crime and by government agencies that have stopped doing their job," Gutiérrez said in Spanish at news conference at his lawyer's office.
Gutiérrez's request for political asylum comes at a time of heightened drug-related violence across the state of Chihuahua and in other parts of Mexico.
The Committee to Protect Journalists has ranked Mexico as one of the deadliest countries for journalists in the Americas.
Gutiérrez on Friday wore a black ribbon on his polo-style shirt in memory of his friend Armando "El Choco" Rodríguez, a crime reporter for a Mexican newspaper. He was shot and killed Nov. 13 outside his Juárez home.
"Believe me, when I heard, when I read about Armando, I saw myself in that article," Gutiérrez said.
Rodríguez's murder remains unsolved.
Daniel Borunda may be reached at dborunda@elpasotimes.com; 546-6102.
This is from the local paper
Reporter from Mexico held by ICE is released
By Daniel Borunda / El Paso Times
Posted: 01/31/2009 12:00:00 AM MST
El PASO -- A Mexican newspaper reporter seeking political asylum in the U.S. because he feared for his life has been released after being held for seven months at an immigration detention center in El Paso.
"I could not believe it," Emilio Gutiérrez Soto said Friday after being unexpectedly released Thursday afternoon by immigration officials.
Several immigrant-rights groups and journalist associations, including the international press freedom group Reporters Without Borders, had asked that Gutiérrez be freed and that Mexican authorities investigate his claims.
"It was a shock," said Gutiérrez's lawyer, Carlos Spector. "I can really attribute it to a change in politics. ... The Obama administration's advent, I think, really sent a message to the local bureaucrats."
Gutiérrez, 46, is considered a parolee. His immigration case is pending, Spector said, and a hearing is possibly set for June.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Leticia Zamarripa said that it is ICE policy not to discuss individual immigration cases.
Gutiérrez, who wrote for El Diario del Noroeste in Ascension, Chihuahua, claims Mexican army officials targeted him after he wrote about allegations of crimes committed by soldiers in communities in the rural northwestern part of Chihuahua state.
Gutiérrez filed a complaint with Mexico's National Commission on Human Rights but said nothing was solved. On May 5, 2008, soldiers raided and searched his home after supposedly getting an anonymous tip that drugs and weapons were inside.
After being warned by a friend that the army was going to kill him, Gutiérrez fled to the U.S. with his 15-year-old son. He asked for asylum on June 16 at the border crossing at Antelope Wells, N.M.
Gutiérrez has been reunited with his son, who was released late last year from an immigration detention center for juveniles. His son had been staying with relatives in the El Paso region while Gutiérrez was detained.
"All journalists are having liberties curtailed in Mexico in part by organized crime and by government agencies that have stopped doing their job," Gutiérrez said in Spanish at news conference at his lawyer's office.
Gutiérrez's request for political asylum comes at a time of heightened drug-related violence across the state of Chihuahua and in other parts of Mexico.
The Committee to Protect Journalists has ranked Mexico as one of the deadliest countries for journalists in the Americas.
Gutiérrez on Friday wore a black ribbon on his polo-style shirt in memory of his friend Armando "El Choco" Rodríguez, a crime reporter for a Mexican newspaper. He was shot and killed Nov. 13 outside his Juárez home.
"Believe me, when I heard, when I read about Armando, I saw myself in that article," Gutiérrez said.
Rodríguez's murder remains unsolved.
Daniel Borunda may be reached at dborunda@elpasotimes.com; 546-6102.