The rooms were small, the mattresses hard and they got mostly canned food to eat with a once-a-day break to go outside.
Juana España Lopez, 71, of Honduras and her daughter, Jackie Merlos of Portland, were allowed to share a room at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Tacoma but that was little comfort, she said.
España Lopez’s blood pressure went up to around 180 and she had to be seen by a nurse, she told The Oregonian/OregonLive on Friday.
España Lopez returned to Portland earlier this week after a hearing and release from the Tacoma center, where she had been held for nearly three months following her arrest in late June with Merlos at Peace Arch Historical State Park in Blaine, Washington, on the Canadian border.
They had been meeting up with España Lopez’s other daughter who lives in British Columbia.
Democratic lawmakers from Oregon and Washington decried the women’s arrests and the detention of Merlos’ four U.S.-born children who were also at the park. Their father, Carlos Merlos, was arrested in Portland several days later and also is being held in Tacoma.
The kids were allowed to leave Washington after about two weeks and are now staying with family friends in Portland.
“The trauma doesn’t go away,” España Lopez said in Spanish. “I’m so traumatized that I have nightmares that I’m still there.”
She said Jackie Merlos is always thinking about her children.
“She suffers a lot because of the children,” she said. “I would console her, ‘Daughter, don’t worry, we are going to get out of here.’”
España Lopez and her husband had travel visas and arrived in Portland on May 22 to spend two months visiting family, she said. They had booked a return flight to Honduras on July 22.
They followed all the rules only for España Lopez to be treated with “an injustice … I had never experienced before,” she said. “I have never been in jail.”
U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents confronted the family at the park during the gathering and took away España Lopez, Jackie Merlos and the children in a frightening and confusing encounter, she said.
Federal authorities initially leveled “alien smuggling” allegations against Jackie Merlos but dropped them in mid-July without explanation.
ICE officials didn’t respond Friday to a request for comment on the status of the family’s case.
Jill Nedved, who was introduced as the family’s lawyer during a press conference in July, also didn’t respond to a request for comment. Earlier this month, she said she couldn’t comment on active cases.
U.S. Rep. Maxine Dexter, D-Oregon, said España Lopez’s release is a welcome relief but also serves as a reminder of the United States’ broken immigration system.
“Despite having a valid travel visa and a plane ticket home, ICE wasted over $15,000 detaining a 71-year-old grandmother in a for-profit facility operated by GEO Group — a top Trump donor,” Dexter said in an email. “This calculated cruelty is designed to maximize profits and dehumanize our neighbors. I am more committed than ever to putting an end to this morally bankrupt system.”
España Lopez said she spent a lot of time at the Tacoma center praying with her daughter and other women there.
She said Carlos Merlos is expected to have a hearing in the next few days and the family hopes that he’ll, too, be released. His legal status has not been made public.
“The children need him,” she said. “They need him and their mother.”
Jackie Merlos has a hearing on Oct. 14. She has a pending U visa, which allows victims of crime to remain in the country legally.
España Lopez and her husband are waiting to see their daughter before they return to Honduras on Oct. 18, she said.
Her husband refused to go home without her, España Lopez said.
“We came together,” she said. “We will leave together.”