New Delhi: A Honduran mother has accused US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) of deporting her without her two-year-old son who was later killed in Florida while staying with relatives.
According to The Washington Post, Wendy Hernandez Reyes said she repeatedly pleaded with immigration officials not to separate her from her son, Orlin Josue Hernandez Reyes before she was deported to Honduras in January.
The child later died in March in Escambia County, Florida. The authorities said the boy suffered severe injuries including broken ribs, burns and internal damage. Officials also noted signs of possible sexual abuse. His uncle was later arrested on murder allegations linked to the child’s death.
Mother rejects ICE claims
After the boy’s death, ICE released a statement accusing Wendy Hernandez Reyes of abandoning her son in the United States. The agency claimed she “chose to leave her son here with a violent murderer who took his life.”
ICE Director Todd M Lyons also said parents facing deportation are given the chance to leave the country with their children. However, Hernandez Reyes strongly rejected those claims.
“How could I abandon my son, if my son was the love of my life?” she told The Washington Post. “I did everything with my son. I am not a bad mother who left my child with a killer.”
Hernandez’s arrest and deportation
Wendy Hernandez Reyes was reportedly travelling with her sister in Alabama in January when police stopped their vehicle on the way to work. The Baldwin County Sheriff’s Office later handed her over to ICE under the 287(g) programme, which allows local law enforcement agencies to assist federal immigration authorities.
She was then transferred to a detention centre in Louisiana where ICE officials said a judge had previously ordered her deportation after she missed an immigration hearing connected to her asylum application filed in 2022.