INS Criticized for Deporting 2 Omaha High School Students

Two high school students were yanked from class and deported to Mexico by immigration officials who said the teen-agers were illegally in the United States.

Two immigration officials summoned Ambrosio Lopez, 17, from class at Omaha South High School on Nov. 6

He was held at a detention center then flown to southern Arizona and escorted across the Mexican border, the Omaha World-Herald reported Sunday. He had little money and no change of clothes.

Immigration officials also arrested Augustin Antunez, 15, at South High and deported him.

Jim Ramirez, community relations specialist for the Omaha School District, said the Immigration and Naturalization Service acted irresponsibly.

“They had no regard for their safety,” Ramirez said, “They left them at the border like two stray pups they wanted to get rid of. Would they take any other 15- or 17-year-olds 2,000 miles away and leave them unattended?”

Antunez had been in the United States since 1988. His parents are legal residents under the 1986 federal amnesty law.

Lopez had been in the United States since 1984. Maria Lopez, a single mother, said she is trying to change her temporary residency status to permanent residency under the U.S. amnesty law.

An INS official said both teen-agers had exhausted their deportation appeal process, a judge had ordered them to leave the country and arrest warrants had been issued.

Lopez has been staying at a hotel in Juarez, Mexico, with an 18-year-old brother who left Omaha last month.

Antunez and his 21-year-old brother, who was arrested at his restaurant job and deported, are staying with their grandfather in Mexico.