Homeboy walks off a Mexicana Airlines flight at San Jose International
\nAirport, waits in line and hands me his passport, I-94 and Customs
\nDeclaration. He’s a little too happy to be here.
\nI look at his passport – it’s Costa Rican – and think “what the hell is he
\ndoing on a Mexicana flight?” It’s a round-about way of getting to the U.S.
\nfrom Costa Rica, and more expensive than taking Taca (the central american
\ncarrier). I run his name and don’t come up with anything interesting in
\nthe computer. Flipping through the pages I see a couple entries to the
\nU.S., but not enough to prove anything. He says he’s coming to visit a
\nfriend for two weeks.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\nI ask for his airline tickets and read his itinerary codes: SJO-MEX-SJC,
\nSJC-MEX-SJO. I think “San Jose (California) to Mexico City to San Jose
\n(Costa Rica) and back. Why does he have a round-trip originating in
\nCalifornia?”<\/p>\n
\nI refer him to secondary as a possible 7A: Immigrant without immigrant
\nvisa. 212(7)(A)(i)(i) is one of the more common charges I throw at people
\nif the computers turn up nothing; it basically says “I think he’s living
\nand working here”.<\/p>\n
\nIn Secondary the computers turn up nothing about overstays or prior
\nencounters. They throw his bags around (READ: search) and come up with a
\nresume, a letter of recommendation, an attaboy certificate from Burger
\nKing, US bank statements and a bunch of other pieces of paper saying he
\nhas lived and worked in the U.S. The lead officer’s impressed with the
\nreferal: We’ve got enough to send him back as an Expedited Removal (ER)
\nwhether he admits to anything or not. There’s no more Mexicana flights
\nfrom this port so the decision is made to take him back to SFO. <\/p>\n
\nI ask him to empty his pockets and jewelry into his bag – sun glasses,
\nwallet, watch, gum, Visine, belt… he asks if he should put his cash in
\nhis bag too. This is always a concern for folks from Latin America.
\nApparently Mexicana airline employees have a habit of stealing from the
\nbags of Central Americans (he says it’s because Costa Rica has a better
\nsoccer team). I check the roll for tools\/weapons and tell him to keep the
\ncash in his pocket. He’s still happy and says “I understand, it’s your
\njob.”<\/p>\n
\nI ask him if he has any weapons and he says he doesn’t, “no weapons. I’m
\nnot going to fight you.” Another junior officer frisks him and in the
\nprocess damn near puts him in the splits. I intervene, which our Costa
\nRican friend appreciates. I instruct our man to assume the position and
\nthe same officer hand cuffs him, just a little too tight. Again I
\nintervene, and I’ve earned the “Good Cop” label. We don’t actually play
\nthis game, but it usually occurs when I’m around anyway.<\/p>\n
\n“I’m not going to run away,” he says. <\/p>\n
\n“I know you’re not going to run away,” I laugh.<\/p>\n
\n“They hurt,” he says.<\/p>\n
\n“The handcuffs?” He nods. “Put your hands like this,” I say. “They won’t
\nhurt as much.”<\/p>\n
\n“I’m not going to run away,” he says.<\/p>\n
\n“I’m sorry, it’s how we have to do it,” I reply.<\/p>\n
\n“I understand, it’s your job.”<\/p>\n
\nWe gather the bags, load up the van and head off to The Port.<\/p>\n
The lead officer turns to me in the van and says “I want you to tell him
\nsomething for me.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\n“Alright,” I reply.<\/p>\n
\n“Tell him we’re going to try to get him on the next flight to Mexico so he
\ndoesn’t have to spend the night in jail. But in order to do that he’s
\ngoing to have to cooperate and tell us the truth.”
\nIn my round-about Spanish I convey the message to the seat behind me. The
\nresponse comes back, “the truth about what?” <\/p>\n
\n“About why you’re coming to the U.S.; about living here; about your
\nemployment; about everything.”<\/p>\n
\n“uh… come again?”<\/p>\n
\n“There are two ways this can go: you can lie to us, or not tell us
\nanything, and it will take more time. Because it takes more time we won’t
\nbe able to put you on the next flight and you’ll have to sleep in a jail
\ntonight. Or, if you tell us the truth about living and working in the
\nUnited States, it is possible you’ll be able to leave tonight.”<\/p>\n
\n“I worked here in 2000, but that’s not why I’m coming this time. I’ll tell
\nyou the truth.”<\/p>\n
\n“Thank you.”<\/p>\n
\n“I understand, it’s your job.”<\/p>\n
\n“Everybody’s got one.” He thought that was funny.<\/p>\n
\nFor a moment the only sound is the highway and the radio. In my periferal
\nvision I see the lead officer turn to look at me.<\/p>\n
\n“He worked here in 2000,” I say.<\/p>\n
\n“Well done.”<\/p>\n
\n“Thank you.” <\/p>\n
\n“How many is that?”<\/p>\n
\n“That’s number two.”<\/p>\n
The period after arriving at SFO is a blur of fingerprints, photographs,
\ninterrogation, government forms and computer terminals. Through the wonder
\nof the division of labor, four or five hours of work gets been blasted out
\nin under 60 minutes. Seconds before I escort him to his flight the
\nking-high Mucky Muck announces that homeboy is going to be allowed to
\nwithdrawl his application for admission. The lead officer looks at me a
\nsays “you got robbed. I think you can count it anyway, though.” I shrug.
\nThe decision is way above my pay grade.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\nMore forms are signed and we march off to a departing Mexicana flight. All
\nsorts of things are being adjusted behind me as a result of the change of
\nplans, none of which I particularily understand.<\/p>\n
\nI explain to our friend that he’s really, really lucky. For some reason
\nthe big chief changed his mind and instead of ERing him, he was allowed to
\nwithdrawl. What’ s the difference ? A withdrawl doesn’t have a five year bar
\nfrom the U.S.; he could theoretically go get a visa tomorrow and legally
\nre-enter the U.S.<\/p>\n
He says “thank you” before he gets on the plane.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
It’s approaching 1:30 am and it’s time to go home.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Homeboy walks off a Mexicana Airlines flight at San Jose International Airport, waits in line and hands me his passport, I-94 and Customs Declaration. He’s a little too happy to be here. I look at his passport – it’s Costa Rican – and think “what the hell is he doing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"webmentions_disabled_pings":false,"webmentions_disabled":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[20,37,23],"class_list":["post-164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-on-the-line","tag-immigration","tag-mexico","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=164"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opendna.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}