11 Records of Alleged Abusive or Improper Conduct where the victim classification is “Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim”

October 12, 2022

A report published by Oxfam America and the Tahirih Justice Center included service providers’ accounts of CBP officers ridiculing and scolding victims of violence seeking to apply for asylum at land-border ports of entry, a right that had been curtailed by the Title 42 pandemic expulsion policy.

the behavior of CBP officers toward asylum seekers is often demeaning; a number of respondents recount instances where they ignored or belittled survivors:

“Yeah, I mean, we’ve had people who are victims of gender- based violence in Mexico, go to the port of entry and ask immigration officials if they could apply for asylum…[In some cases] immigration officials responded by laughing at the person. I’ve seen this personally in multiple cases.” [63]

Such behavior by CBP officers not only leaves survivors feeling degraded, but contrary to the dictates of the Refugee Convention, it can also discourage survivors from asking for asylum at all, even upon arriving at the border:

“She wanted to tell the officer, ‘I want to seek asylum. I’m afraid to return to my country.’ But the officer made it impossible for her to say that; he did not allow her [to speak], shut her down every single moment and said, ‘I am talking, you need to listen to me.’” [64]

— Duvisac, Sara, and Irena Sullivan. “Surviving Deterrence: How Us Asylum Deterrence Policies Normalize Gender-Based Violence.” United States: Oxfam America, Tahirih Justice Center, October 12, 2022. <https://www.tahirih.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Oxfam_Tahirh_Surviving-Deterrence_English_2022.pdf>.

Footnotes from above:

[63] Interview 7, February 2022.

[64] Interview 25, February 2022.

Sector(s): Border-Wide

Agency(ies): Office of Field Operations

Event Type(s): Abusive Language, Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable

Last Known Accountability Status: Unknown

Victim Classification: Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Female

Mid-September 2022

The Nogales-based Kino Border Initiative (KBI) related the expulsion of a Honduran mother and children seeking to escape sexual abuse and prolonged captivity, even after Border Patrol agents gave her hope of being able to seek asylum.

Heydi [name changed to protect privacy] and her 2 daughters fled Honduras where a member of organized crime had held Heydi captive for the past 10 years and forced her to have children with him. When BP apprehended Heydi and her daughters in the desert, she showed an agent evidence that she had been held captive and explained that she wanted to seek asylum. He only said, “okay.” On the bus to Tucson, she approached an agent that she noticed spoke Spanish well and explained her situation. He asked to see the evidence, read over the papers and told her to show them to the agents in Tucson so that they could help her. Once in Tucson, she asked the agent processing her how she could request asylum. He responded, “No, we can’t help you.” That same day, Heydi and her daughters were expelled to Nogales, Sonora, where they live in fear of being deported to Honduras, as they have no authorization to stay in Mexico.

— “September 15 update from KBI” (Nogales: Kino Border Initiative, September 15, 2022).

Sector(s): Tucson

Agency(ies): Border Patrol

Event Type(s): Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable

Last Known Accountability Status: Unknown

Victim Classification: Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Family Unit, Female, Honduras

March and April, 2022

An April 2022 report from Human Rights First, the Haitian Bridge Alliance, and Al Otro Lado lists several examples of San Diego CBP port-of-entry officers’ refusals to grant humanitarian exceptions to Title 42 for especially vulnerable asylum seekers.

In April 2022, CBP denied humanitarian exemption requests for a Nigerian man with glaucoma and hand tremors who was beaten by police in Mexico; a gay Venezuelan man living with HIV who is partially deaf; a Mexican torture survivor with diabetes; a Haitian woman with a high-risk pregnancy who is experiencing food insecurity; and a disabled Honduran man whose injuries from a car accident have become infected and who needs specialized medical treatment. These requests had been submitted by Ginger Cline, an attorney with Al Otro Lado.

CBP officers at the San Ysidro port of entry have also recently denied humanitarian exemption requests for a Mexican woman fleeing threats by a cartel who murdered the woman’s husband and whose 12-year- old son has a pacemaker and urgently needs specialized medical treatment; a 14-year-old with a traumatic brain injury he incurred from falling from a two-story building to escape kidnappers; and a two- year-old Honduran asylum-seeking child with severe and worsening epilepsy who suffers from eight- minute-long seizures. Margaret Cargioli, an attorney with Immigrant Defenders Law Center in San Diego, had submitted these requests ultimately denied by CBP.

CBP at the San Ysidro port of entry has failed to respond to humanitarian exemption requests submitted months ago, including for a LGBTQ woman with maternal uterine fibroids who experiences constant bleeding after she was raped twice in Mexico in bias-motivated attacks based on her sexual orientation and for a Mexican domestic violence victim whose husband found her in Tijuana and kidnapped her daughter, according to Immigrant Defenders Law Center.

Extending Title 42 Would Escalate Dangers, Exacerbate Disorder, and Magnify Discrimination (New York: Human Rights First, Haitian Bridge Alliance, Al Otro Lado, April 27, 2022) https://www.humanrightsfirst.org/resource/extending-title-42-would-escalate-dangers-exacerbate-disorder-and-magnify-discrimination.

Sector(s): San Diego Field Office

Agency(ies): Office of Field Operations

Event Type(s): Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable

Last Known Accountability Status: Unknown

Victim Classification: Accompanied Child, Black, Disability, Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Family Unit, Female, Haiti, Honduras, Kidnap Victim, LGBTQ, Medical Condition, Mexico, Nigeria, Pregnancy, Single Adult, Venezuela

January 13, 2022

A January 2022 Human Rights First report discussed CBP’s denial of humanitarian parole requests for highly vulnerable migrants at the San Ysidro Port of Entry between San Diego and Tijuana.

CBP has denied or ignored more than 100 of the 147 humanitarian parole requests Al Otro Lado submitted to the San Ysidro port of entry, according to attorney Ginger Cline. People denied parole by CBP at the San Ysidro port of entry since December 2021 include: a Salvadoran woman with epilepsy who was kidnapped, drugged, and beaten in Mexico; a Haitian man who experienced two racially motivated assaults in Tijuana; a Mexican woman fleeing cartel threats and severe domestic violence whose 9-year-old child was sexually abused; a Haitian man with painful growths on his chest who was sexually assaulted by his employer and who has been unable to access medical treatment in Tijuana; and a LGBTQ Haitian person who was assaulted in Mexico.

Yet, at other U.S. ports of entry, including Brownsville and Hidalgo, CBP officers have approved hundreds of humanitarian parole requests since late 2021, according to Charlene D’Cruz with Lawyers for Good Government.

A Shameful Record: Biden Administration’s Use of Trump Policies Endangers People Seeking Asylum (New York: Human Rights First: January 13, 2022) https://www.humanrightsfirst.org/resource/shameful-record-biden-administration-s-use-trump-policies-endangers-people-seeking-asylum.

Sector(s): San Diego Field Office

Agency(ies): CBP

Event Type(s): Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable

Last Known Accountability Status: Unknown

Victim Classification: Black, Disability, Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, El Salvador, Family Unit, Haiti, Kidnap Victim, LGBTQ, Mexico, Sexual Abuse Victim

Early July, 2021

The Kino Border Initiative reported:

One teenager arrived with her sister after Border Patrol denied them a credible fear screening. She explained to border officials that she was fleeing the man who raped her, beat her sister, and was pursuing her as she left. On one occasion, a US official reached into her blouse and bra, despite her protests, to take documents relating to her sexual abuse and laughed at her while reading her papers.

— “July 8 Update From KBI” (Nogales: Kino Border Initiative, July 8, 2021).

Sector(s): Tucson

Agency(ies): Border Patrol

Event Type(s): Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable, Sexual Assault or Harassment

Last Known Accountability Status: Shared with Congressional Oversight Committees, Unknown

Victim Classification: Accompanied Child, Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Female, Sexual Abuse Victim

Mid-June, 2021

The Kino Border Initiative reported:

A woman fleeing with her children from domestic violence reported that Border Patrol agents laughed at one of her daughters when she told them she was crying because of the abuse she’d suffered. Once the family was taken to a Border Patrol station, another agent reportedly yelled at the mother after she had expressed that she could not return to her country for fear of further violence, saying “look, you’re here as a migrant. You didn’t have a reason for crossing into this country. You’re going back to your country as you arrived, or worse.”

— “June 24 Update From KBI” (Nogales: Kino Border Initiative, June 24, 2021).

Sector(s): Tucson

Agency(ies): Border Patrol

Event Type(s): Abusive Language, Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable

Last Known Accountability Status: Shared with Congressional Oversight Committees, Unknown

Victim Classification: Accompanied Child, Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Family Unit, Female

April 2, 2021

A report from the Kino Border Initiative (KBI) and NETWORK recounted a Guatemalan asylum seeker’s experience in custody in Border Patrol’s outpost at Sasabe, Arizona, and station in Tucson, Arizona.

A Guatemalan woman crossed into the United States walking through the desert. She became ill and fainted. When she came to, a Border Patrol Agent was standing over her. She was taken to an outpost and processed.

There, she told the agents about the violence she had faced, and that she had proof of threats she had received. The agent said he didn’t speak Spanish but that she should take it up with officers at the next station. In Tucson, she was made to remove her outerwear (her jacket and two shirts and a pair of pants) even though the facility was cold.

She was sent into room with a TV, and on the TV screen it said that if anyone was experiencing violence, they should speak to an agent. She then called the agents and said she wanted to apply for asylum. They told her that was unavailable because of the pandemic. The agents started yelling at her that she should have gone to a port of entry if she wanted asylum, and that she was breaking the law by coming this way. They said to her that she was doing what the mafia does, crossing the border illegally.

Additionally, officers threw the name of her abuser in her face and taunted her, telling her they were going to call him. She felt humiliated by the agent’s actions. By this time, she had had three separate agents decline to help her apply for asylum. She was expelled to Mexico the next morning.

As of 8/17/2021, KBI has received no response to this complaint [filed on June 15, 2021].

Due Process Denied (United States: Kino Border Initiative (KBI) and NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice, August 2021) https://networklobby.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/KINO-NETWORK-CBP-Abuses-consolidated.pdf.

Sector(s): Tucson

Agency(ies): Border Patrol

Event Type(s): Abusive Language, Conditions in Custody, Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable

Last Known Accountability Status: Complaint Filed with CRCL, Complaint Filed with OPR

Victim Classification: Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Female, Guatemala, Single Adult

January 31, 2021

A report from the Kino Border Initiative (KBI) and NETWORK described a Honduran woman’s inability, while in Border Patrol custody, to seek asylum and avoid Title 42 expulsion into Mexico.

A Honduran woman fled domestic abuse from a partner in Honduras who is connected to organized crime. She filed a police report in Honduras and he threatened her even more.

While traveling through Mexico, she feared being forced into prostitution to survive. She was able to avoid this. On the way to the United States, she was kidnapped by the cartel and ransomed for one thousand dollars. When a friend was able to pay the ransom, the cartel dropped her and 38 others off in the desert.

Once she entered the United States through the desert she was detained by Border Patrol. At that time, she told the Border Patrol agent she wanted a lawyer to claim asylum. The agent said she will be able to ask for one at the next facility. At the next facility she asked again and said she needed help to file for protection. The agent she spoke to at that facility knew Spanish. This agent said he couldn’t do anything about it and that she could tell someone in the next facility she will be transferred to. Then she was taken to the Tucson Border Patrol station where she told another agent she wanted a lawyer to file for asylum. The agent said he was not going to violate immigration law for her or anyone else. He said she did not have rights because she arrived illegally. She tried to tell her story of violence and persecution to several other agents, but the first one didn’t allow her to speak to anyone else and just shouted at her to get on the bus.

She was expelled to Nogales, Sonora. She fears that Mexico is also unsafe for her since it is where the cartel who kidnapped her operates. While in Mexico, she has been “approached by men in a dark vehicle” and she worries that she will be attacked.

KBI filed a February 5, 2021 complaint with the DHS Office on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL) and the CBP Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR). On February 25, CRCL emailed “that they received the complaint, recorded it intheir database, and no further actions would be taken. No details were provided about disciplinary actions for officers or recourse for victims of abuse.”

Due Process Denied (United States: Kino Border Initiative (KBI) and NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice, August 2021) https://networklobby.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/KINO-NETWORK-CBP-Abuses-consolidated.pdf.

Sector(s): Tucson

Agency(ies): Border Patrol

Event Type(s): Dangerous Deportation, Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable, Lying or Deliberate Misleading

Last Known Accountability Status: Complaint Filed with CRCL, Complaint Filed with OPR, No Further Action

Victim Classification: Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Female, Honduras, Kidnap Victim

Late September, 2020

The Kino Border Initiative reported:

Three unaccompanied minors were expelled to Nogales under Title 42 in late September. These children entered the United States in an attempt to seek asylum and reunite with their mother, after suffering abuse in the home of a family member in Mexico. In response, a Florence Project attorney accompanied the children to seek asylum at a Port of Entry in Nogales, advocating that the children receive a Credible Fear Interview. CBP turned the children away. Last week, the attorney tried again to accompany the children to the Port of Entry, this time to request humanitarian parole. Despite significant congressional advocacy and insistence by the attorney that the U.S. government uphold its obligation to these children under the Convention Against Torture, CBP informed the attorney that “no one without papers is allowed to enter at the southern border.”

— “October 15 Update From KBI” (Nogales: Kino Border Initiative, October 15, 2020).

Sector(s): Tucson Field Office

Agency(ies): Office of Field Operations

Event Type(s): Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable, Expulsion of Unaccompanied Minor

Last Known Accountability Status: Shared with Congressional Oversight Committees, Unknown

Victim Classification: Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Mexico, Unaccompanied Child

July 5, 2020

A report from the Border Network for Human Rights included the testimony of “P.G.L.,” a legal permanent U.S. resident whose partner was detained by Border Patrol in Sunland Park, New Mexico. He believes that agents racially profiled him and his partner, and used abusive language with them.

My name is P.G.L., and I am a resident of Sunland Park, New Mexico. My partner and I have been victims of harassment and discrimination by the Border Patrol. On Jul. 5, 2020, at around 9 a.m., we were followed by a truck and a border patrol SUV two blocks from my house. We were on our way to work and stopped at my son’s house, but he wasn’t there, so we headed to Mesa Verde St. when they stopped us.

They asked us where the bodies were of those we were going to pick up. I responded that we did not do that type of work. I told them my boss lived a street away, and I am a roofer. This was when an officer asked me to show him my legal documents. My partner was asked first, and she responded that she had a border crossing visa. Then they asked me, and I told them I did not have them with me but that I was a legal permanent resident (LPR). They did not believe me and thought I was lying.

One officer started investigating my partner. They told her they were going to arrest her and then gave her an option to either see an immigration judge or be sent back to Mexico since her visa was still valid and she could use it to come back. The officers became very rude and had my partner get into their truck. I was unable to speak to her. They took me back to my house to get the proof that I was an LPR. I asked them to allow me to speak to my partner because she was the one who knew where my documents were, but they refused and continued to be rude. I went inside the house to show them the proof, and I brought my partner a backpack and her purse.

I have been communicating with my partner over the phone. She tells me she is doing fine, but she is worried about her two daughters because they had to stay with their aunt. Her daughters are both U.S. citizens; they are 12 and 10 years old.

I am worried about my partner’s daughters’ safety; they fled because of domestic violence from their biological dad. I feel that I was discriminated against because of my appearance; for being Hispanic. Now I am scared to drive and be stopped again. I also want to add that a week before this incident, I had been followed and stopped by the same officer, questioned, and let go. Although at the time I had not paid attention to his name, I recognized him this time. I felt I had been harassed by the border patrol.

The Border Network for Human Rights stated that it shared this and other testimonies in its February 2022 abuse monitoring report “with the agencies involved.”

The State of Human Rights at the U.S. – Mexico Border: Abuse Documentation 2022 Campaign Report (El Paso, Border Network for Human Rights, February 22, 2022) https://bnhr.org/abuse-documentation-2022-campaign-report/.

Sector(s): El Paso

Agency(ies): Border Patrol

Event Type(s): Abusive Language, Dangerous Deportation, Racial Discrimination or Profiling

Last Known Accountability Status: Unknown

Victim Classification: Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Single Adult, U.S. Citizen or Resident

Late May 2020

The Kino Border Initiative reported:

A young Guatemalan woman arrived in Nogales last week after fleeing domestic violence. Her partner had beaten her and her children. When she left him, he threatened to take away her children and continued to look for her to beat her children. When she crossed into the US to seek asylum, Border Patrol expelled her under Title 42 without giving her access to a fear assessment.

— “May 27 Update From KBI” (Nogales: Kino Border Initiative, May 2020).

Sector(s): Tucson

Agency(ies): Border Patrol

Event Type(s): Denial of Protection to Most Vulnerable

Last Known Accountability Status: Shared with Congressional Oversight Committees, Unknown

Victim Classification: Domestic or Gender-Based Violence Victim, Female, Guatemala