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After Deportation Delay, Youngstown’s Amer Adi Incomprehensibly Detained by ICE With Congressman Tim Ryan At His Side

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ICE Field Office Director Rebecca Adducci Has An “Appetite for Destruction” of OH & MI Families

Cleveland, OH – With the surprise detention of Youngstown’s Amer Adi, Rebecca Adducci, Director of the Detroit Field Office of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, seems to be angling for a gold star from her bosses in Washington, DC.  Consider the latest from her office:

1) BREAKING NEWS TODAY: Amer Adi, a Youngstown businessman credited for playing a major role in revitalizing downtown, was taken into custody at the Cleveland ICE office.  Congressman Tim Ryan and Adi’s lawyer David Leopold accompanied Adi to what they thought would be an uneventful meeting.  Adi was supposed to be deported earlier this month, but he received an emergency reprieve.  His detention today baffled and angered supporters such as Rep. Ryan and Tracey Winbush, Mahoning County Republican Party vice chairwoman.  As the Vindicatorreports: “With tears in her eyes, Winbush said she’s still trying to call people about the case.”

2) Yesterday, Adducci’s agents deported Jorge Garcia, a Michigan father of U.S. citizens who came to the United States at the age of ten.  Jorge’s deportation, after three decades in the United States, garnered national attention.

3) Adducci’s office continues to demand the deportation of Yancarlos Mendez, a stepfather and caregiver for a paralyzed American child. Yancarlos is one of only two people trained to care for six year-old Ricky.  Yancarlos’ deportation was temporarily paused by the Sixth Circuit in an emergency stay last weekend, but he remains in immigration jail, facing future deportation.

Speaking of Adi, his attorney  David Leopold said:

This is a man who has played by the rules ever since he arrived in the United States. In the last several years, he has jumped through every hoop that ICE asked him to jump through. He came voluntarily to the ICE office today, accompanied by Rep. Ryan and myself, for what was supposed to be a routine check-in, only to be thrown into a jail cell and told he would be deported by force. It is important to remember that Mr. Adi was set to leave the U.S. with his wife two weeks ago. He had bought a ticket and made arrangements to voluntarily meet ICE at the airport. ICE then cancelled the deportation – that they would today take him into custody is beyond baffling. I can only conclude that it is a brazen show of cruelty and an attempt to dehumanize and humiliate my client Mr. Adi.

Said Lynn Tramonte, Director of America’s Voice Ohio:

Since the Trump Administration threw out any semblance of prioritization for deportation decisions, Rebecca Adducci and her henchmen have gleefully and relentlessly torn mothers and fathers from their American kids.  She’s clearly angling for a gold star from Washington or maybe a promotion.  Meanwhile, Ohio and Michigan families are being devastated, both psychologically and financially.  Who is going to be there for the kids when Mom or Dad are gone?  Why are we creating even more separated families?

Many of the cases Adducci has presided over have received national and even international attention.  They exemplify an incomprehensible level of cruelty that is far out of step with American values.  Unless stopped by the courts – which is rare given the paltry due process our current immigration laws contain – people who were put at the end of the priority list under previous administrations are now being fast-tracked for permanent banishment.

Tramonte continued:

Adducci’s deportation decisions are cold and callous.  She’s creating broken families up and down our two states.  It doesn’t matter how long Amer Adi has lived here, or how many Americans he employs.  It doesn’t matter if Jesus Lara owned his home, paid taxes, and worked legally to support his four American children.  And it clearly doesn’t matter if U.S. citizens like Juan will suffer both physically and mentally when his stepdadPedro Hernandez is deported.  Adducci has an appetite for destruction of American families, and she’s executing that policy across Ohio and Michigan every single day.

Local media have covered the deportation cases extensively, as have national and even international outlets.  In Jorge Garcia’s case, USA Today reprinted a Detroit Free Press article, and the Washington Post has its own piece that includes video of the family’s heart-wrenching goodbye.  In her Twitter account, New York Times Editorial Assistant Rosa Goldensohn lists an overwhelming number of similar cases all across the United States.  Several of them were carried out by Detroit’s Adducci and her agents.

Rebecca Adducci has a long and checkered career as Director of Detroit ICE.  In 2011, her office was described as one of the worst-run in the country.  Examples included a Michigan Dreamer who was detained with his mother and forced to watch while she was strip-searched.  When his mother protested, the officer responded, “You’re lucky we don’t just shoot you in the head.” Other incidents involved a six-month pregnant woman being refused medical care, children being stalked by ICE agents at elementary schools, and US citizens being shackled when ICE agents refused to accept their identification.

More recently, in addition to rubber-stamping the deportation of moms and dads with no criminal record; Adducci has presided over:

These are just a few of the incidents who have made it into the public sphere.