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‘The public needs to wake up’: Rhode Island mom detained at Logan for more than a week
The woman, a legal permanent resident for 40 years, is being denied access to a lawyer while being held by Customs and Border Protection.
A mother of six from Rhode Island who has legal permanent resident status has been detained at Logan Airport by federal officials for more than a week, according to her lawyer.
Eva Mendes, of Woonsocket, first immigrated to the US from Cape Verde as an 8-year-old. She has been living in the country for the past 40 years. In October, Mendes traveled back to Cape Verde after the sudden loss of her brother.
“It was also meant to be a joyful reunion — a chance to surprise her mother, whom she hadn’t seen in over 40 years. What was meant to be a healing visit of love and family turned into an unimaginable nightmare,” the organizer of a GoFundMe set up to support Mendes and her family wrote alongside the online fundraiser.
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When Mendes returned to Logan on Nov. 5, she was detained by officials from Customs and Border Protection. She is still being detained at the airport as of Friday morning, according to her lawyer Todd Pomerleau. She has been allowed to speak with family members, but has not been allowed to speak with Pomerleau, he said.
To justify her detention, officials must prove that she is either a danger or a flight risk, Pomerleau said.
“She has a green card, why would she flee her green card? She’s been living here permanently for 40 years,” he said. “Where is she going to flee to? She’s coming back to the United States.”
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Mendes was apparently detained because of minor charges on her criminal record. She pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor shoplifting charge in 2009, according to court documents obtained by The Boston Globe. In 2012, she was again charged with shoplifting and was issued a warrant after failing to appear at her arraignment.
Mendes has traveled outside the country numerous times without incident, including as recently as last year, Pomerleau said. Before her recent trip to Cape Verde, Mendes checked in with an immigration office in Rhode Island and was assured that she could travel safely as a green card holder, per the Globe.
Mendes has raised six children, all US citizens, with a long-term partner.
“Eva is not a threat to anyone. She is a mother, a wife, a neighbor, and a kindhearted woman who deserves compassion and due process,” the fundraiser caption reads.
A CBP spokesperson confirmed that officers working at Logan encountered and detained Mendes on Nov. 5.
“The subject arrived at Boston Logan international Airport as a legal permanent resident. During inspection, officers discovered the individual’s criminal history and past convictions. The subject remains in custody, pending a hearing with an immigration judge,” a CBP spokesperson said in a statement. “While individual remains in OFO custody, we cannot comment with additional details due to privacy concerns.”
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Pomerleau filed a habeas petition for Mendes, one of about 75 he has filed in just the last six months. This is “tenfold” the number he was filing before the recent changes to immigration enforcement under the Trump administration, he said.
Pomerleau believes that CBP is justifying its denial of Mendes’s right to counsel by saying that she is not yet officially in the US and is instead being “inspected” before returning.
“If it takes you eight or nine days to inspect somebody, one would think there’s a problem here with your inspection process,” he said.
Mendes is just the latest person to be detained at Logan for an extended period of time this year. A German national who was held for weeks alleged CBP agents used “violent interrogation” tactics on him before he was hospitalized. A Canton mom was similarly held for 10 days at Logan.
Pomerleau called these tactics “un-American” and voiced concerns about the lack of due process being afforded to his clients and others.
“I don’t care if you’re accused of terrorism, you bring somebody to trial. You have due process of law,” he said. “It applies to all ‘persons,’ not just citizens. That’s what the Constitution has said for 250 years.”
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Pomerleau hopes to see Mendes released soon, but worries that she will have to be held by ICE in another state due to a purported lack of beds for female detainees in Massachusetts. Other clients of his have been held in poor conditions inside ICE’s Burlington facility, he said, and he has agreed to have them transferred out of state after being told that there were no beds for them in Massachusetts.
Mendes’s case represents a larger pattern of misconduct, Pomerleau says. He is urging members of the public to take notice.
“This never should have happened to her,” he said. “We need to demand more as a society, and the public needs to wake up and know what’s going on because it’s a daunting task to fight these cases. The public, I don’t think, is fully aware of what the government is doing because the narrative we are being told is contradicted by reality, by facts, and by the law.”
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