PROPUBLICA is a non -profit editorial staff that investigates the abuse of power. Initially, this story was published in our dispatch ballot; specify Get notes from our journalists.
In the early days of President Donald Trump, I spent several weeks, watching Chicago’s immigration court to understand how everything is changing. One day in March, the case of 27-year-old Venezuelan asylum seeking asylum has attracted my attention.
Albert Hesus Rodriguez Parra stared at the camera at a virtual communication. He wore an orange shirt given to prisoners in prison in Loreda, Texas and headphones to listen to the translator.
More than a year earlier, Rodriguez was convicted of stealing Chicago. But since then, he seemed to come to life on the way. He found a job at Wrigley Field, sent money home to his mom to Venezuela and went to the gym and church with his girlfriend. Then, in November, the federal authorities detained him in his apartment on the south side of Chicago and accused him of belonging to the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua.
“Are you connected with your tattoos?” His lawyer asked at the hearing, experiencing the evidence outlined against him in a report on immigration and customs execution. “No,” said Rodriguez, whose tattoos include an angel holding a gun, a wolf and a rose. At one point he lifted his shirt to show the names of the parents fixed on his chest.
He was asked about the video Tiktok, showing how he dancing under the audio recording of anyone shouting, “Te va agarrar el tren de agua”, which means: “Tren de Aragua will get you” and behind it a dance bit. This audio clip shared about 60,000 times into Tiktok – it is popular with Venezuelans, making fun of the stereotype that all of their countries are gangster. Rodriguez looked distrustful to this thought this There were evidence against him.
On that day, the judge did not appeal to the gang. But she refused Rodriguez Bond, citing the theft. She reminded him that his last hearing took place on March 20, only 10 days. If she provided him asylum he would be a free man and could continue his life in the USA
I told my editors and colleagues about what I heard and planned to attend the next hearing. I saw the potential for such a complex narrative story I like: there was a young immigrant who, yes, went into the country illegally, but he turned to the border authorities to seek asylum. Yes, he had a conviction, but it was for a non -violent crime. And yes, he had tattoos, but so beautiful, white American moms in my book club. I was sure that there were Tren de Aragua members in the US, but when it was what the government had, it was hard for me to believe it was a “invasion”, as Trump claimed. I asked lawyer Rodriguez about the interview and started asking the police and court records.
Five days, March 15, Trump’s administration sent more than 230 Venezuelan men to the maximum security in Salvador, in a country that many of them did not even move. Trump called them all terrorists and gang members. It would be a few days before the male names are published. It may not have come to mind that Rodriguez could be in this group. Then I went into his last hearing and heard his lawyer said he did not know where the government took him. The lawyer sounded tired and defeated. He later told me he barely slept, fearing that Rodriguez could be dead. At the hearing, he asked a government lawyer on information: “For the sake of your family, you could know which country was he sent to?” She told him she did not know.
Credit:
Andrea Hernandez Brcecen for PROPUBLIC
I was surprised. I am familiar with the history of authoritarian leaders who disappear from people they do not like in Latin America, part of the world from which my family comes. I wanted to think that this country didn’t happen in this country. But what I just witnessed felt uncomfortable.
As soon as the hearing ended, I called my colleagues Mika Rosenberg and Perlo Trivitsa, both of which covered immigration and recently were Written on how the US government has sent other Venezuelan men to Guantanamo. We talked about what to do with what I just heard. Skuby contacted the source in the federal government, which almost immediately confirmed that Rodriguez was among the men whom our country was sent to Salvador.
This news suddenly felt more real and intimate for me. One of the men sent to a rigid prison in Salvador now had the name and face and story I heard from my own mouth. I couldn’t stop thinking about him.
As an information organization, we decided to invest considerable resources in the investigation, who these people actually happened to them, resulting in many talented Propublica journalists help pull out records, sift in the field of social media, analyze the court data and find men’s families. We united with a group of Venezuelan journalists from outlets Rebel Alianza investigates and Fake news who also started tracking information about men.
We talked to relatives and lawyers over 100 men and received internal government records Break the Trump Administration’s claims that all men are “monsters”, “sick criminals” and “worse”. We also published a story about how, by and large, men did not hide from federal immigration bodies. They were in the system; Many were Open Casts of asylum Like Rodriguez, they waited for their day in court before being taken and imprisoned in Central America.
On July 18 – after I wrote you the first project of this note – we started hearing a chatter about the potential exchange of a prisoner between the US and Venezuela. Later on the same day the men were released. We were in the middle of work on the case of the Venezuelan people who were in Salvador. Although they were released by documenting who they were and how they got into this Dragnet, it is still important, even important as the influence of their imprisonment.
As a result – the database we published last week, including Profiles of 238 Trump men deported to the El Salvadoransk prison.
From the moment I heard about the return of men to Venezuela, I thought about Rodriguez. He was in my head starting with this project. I reported a few days with my mother when we were waiting for men treated by Nicolas Maduro government and released to their families.
Credit:
Andrea Hernandez Brcecen for PROPUBLIC
Finally, one morning last week he went home. We talked later on this day. He said he was at home with his family, but felt injured. He told me he wanted the world to know what happened to him in the Salvador prison – a daily beating, humiliation, psychological violence. “There is no reason to survive,” he said. “I didn’t deserve it.”
The government of Salvadaran denied the violent treatment of Venezuelan prisoners.
We asked Trump’s administration about her evidence against Rodriguez. This is all her statement: “Albert Hesus Rodriguez Parra is an illegal aliens from Venezuela and a gang member of Taragua Traga. He illegally crossed the border on April 22, 2023 under the Baden administration.”
While Rodriguez was imprisoned in Salvador, and no one knew what he would be with him, the court continued to detain hearing on the asylum. But after months of continuation, on Monday, Rodriguez entered the virtual hearing from Venezuela. “Oh, God, I’m so pleased to see it,” said Judge Samia Naria, remembering clearly what happened in his case.
Rodriguez’s lawyer said his client was tortured and violent in Salvador. “I can’t even describe in this court what he survived,” he said. “He receives psychological assistance and this is my priority.”
It was a short hearing, perhaps five minutes. Lawyer Rodriguez mentioned his participation in a current lawsuit against the Trump administration on the use of the law on foreign enemies to deport Venezuelans. The government lawyer said little that except whether Rodriguez is allowed even from the “security problems” in Venezuela.
Finally, the judge stated that it would close the case as long as the trial is played. “If he hopes he will be able to return to the United States, we will be a calendar case,” she said.
Naseem turned to Rodriguez, who was muted and looked serious. “You don’t have to worry about it to appear until it is sorted out,” she told him. He nodded his head and soon left.
We plan to continue to report what happened, and another story about Rodriguez and other men’s experiences quickly appeared. Please Contact if you have information to share.
