Losing hope, regaining hope Part 1

It is no secret that working within the walls of the detention center is hard.  Watching a client cry for the first time is something surreal.  The first for me was a man from El Salvador.  Deeply religious and just a baby really, he started to break telling me about his cousin who had been slain by members of MS-13.  He had a cry that began almost as a laugh would, but quickly moved to a heavy, bass, sob.   Immediately my mind left my body.  I was hovering overhead, listening to his story, the whole time gripped with the question of what to do.  He said it was his fault.  That this senseless violence that killed his relative was prompted by his efforts to steer clear of the gang life.  I could not move, could barely form words, and tightened my chest as to not burst into tears myself.

This tightening is now a regular strategy.  It is not that I am afraid of expressing my emotions.  It is just that I have yet to find the fine line between expressing my emotions in support of my client and being a strong, professional, advocate.  Accordingly, I put up a thicker wall than is needed.  

When I met Pato, my wall was at its thickest.  This was back in the early days of the summer, when the demographics at the Aurora detention center flipped on their head.  Instead of performing the normal know your rights spiel, RMIAN was no offering multiple sessions just for folks in Credible Fear (CF) and Reasonable Fear (RF) proceedings.  No longer was it common to talk to someone who had lived in Colorado most of their lives, but was picked up for a traffic charge and then sent to jail.  Much of this had to do with several Denver area counties refusing to respect detainer orders from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).  (For more info regarding detainers in Colorado see: Prof. Lasch's article regarding detainer usage & Denver Post coverage of detainer usage in CO).  Starting around this time, I began traveling to the Aurora detention center to specifically aid asylum seekers (those within CF and RF proceedings and those who had received a positive determination) in filling out I-589 forms in English.  Thus, I had spent many hours talking to detainees regarding the basis for their asylum claims.  Some stories were horrific and violent, while others were odd and inconsistent.  But as these people were not my clients, I was merely helping them translate, I held all emotion and judgment and simply translated their claims.  

Pato showed up in late June, mid July, I can't quite remember.  He too, needed someone to help translate his I-589.  He had already filled in the majority of the form, some of which he had managed to translate into English.  While sorting through his claim, I was surprised at his articulateness and his thoroughness.  At the end of our session he asked me if I could help with other translations and handed me a large stack of papers.  My first thought was, "You have got to be fucking kidding me." I was used to being handed stacks of newspaper clippings and articles that had nothing to do with an individuals personal claim for asylum, but general insecurity in their country.  This type of evidence has been seen time and time again by the Immigration Judges and is only slightly probative.  But as I thumbed through the stack on my way back to the office I realized that these were personalized documents: declarations of what had happened, judicial records, copies of ID cards and diplomas.  I set the documents in the "to be translated" pile, and forgot about Pato for a bit.