Iowa Justice for Our Neighbors

Get to know immigrants through stories
Maria came to the United States in 1985 from El Salvador. Guerrillas threatened to kill Maria and her family if she refused to help them. When Maria refused to help, they burned her corn field and killed her neighbors. Maria fled for her life and filed for asylum in the United States. Maria’s asylum was denied, but when the American Baptist Church filed a class action suite, she joined it, and they won, enabling her to refile her asylum application. This allowed her to apply for a work permit each year; but no action was taken by Immigration on her asylum petition. Finally, in 2005 she had her asylum interview and the judge denied her plea, stating that there was no longer any danger to her in El Salvador.

Before her court date, Maria had contacted Justice For Our Neighbors and they found that she was eligible for Legal Permanent Residence under the Nicaraguan and Central American Relief Act (NACARA). JFON was able to terminate her removal so that she could apply under NACARA, and helped her with the application and 120 pages of supplemental documents and information needed by Immigration. In May 2009, Maria was granted legal permanent residency. After all these years, Maria can live a little more at peace with her husband and four U. S. citizen children.

NACARA is a special program designed for people from Central America who fled to the U.S. because of persecution and filed asylum claims before 1990.

Miguel called the Cedar Rapids JFON office a few weeks ago to tell Gary and Liliana that his Temporary Protective Status (TPS) had been restored. Gary had helped him appeal a decision based on inaccurate information. Miguel and his wife came to the U.S. from Honduras after Hurricane Mitch devastated his village, and in 1999 the U.S. Congress determined that Hondurans and El Salvadorans affected by the damage could work here under Temporary Protective Status (TPS.) Last year, though, Immigration denied Miguel’s TPS because they mistakenly believed that he had four criminal convictions, so Miguel came to JFON. They helped him obtain a copy of his court records saying his one OMVI conviction had been dismissed after he completed a rehabilitation program, and Gary wrote a legal brief to Immigration that explained that they were wrong about his criminal history. With his TPS and work authorization restored, Miguel was happily back on the job and able to continue sending money back to relatives in Honduras.