24588: Hermantin (News) 'Emotional roller coaster' ends

[sak-pase@bimini.ws]

leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>


'Emotional roller coaster' ends as U.S. lets Haitian teen remain
TV cameras caught dramatic run for freedom as refugees' boat landed in Miami
By Ruth Morris
Staff Writer
March 29, 2005

An orphaned refugee whose high-profile asylum claim galvanized South 
Florida's Haitian community will be eligible for a green card more than two 
years after he took part in a televised dash for freedom near the 
Rickenbacker Causeway, his lawyers said Monday.

The decision to allow Ernso "Ernesto" Joseph to apply for permanent 
residence suggested a happy ending to a legal battle in which the boy 
shuttled between federal custody and an uncle's care, and prompted U.S. Rep. 
Kendrick Meek, D-Miami, to intervene on his behalf.

While most of the 200 Haitians who arrived with Joseph have been deported, 
his case stole headlines based on advocates' assertions that his plight 
spotlighted unequal treatment of Haitian refugees. They also pointed to the 
prospect -- later proven fact -- that he was a minor being held in an adult 
detention center.

"It was the government's position that Haitians like Ernso should be kept 
out," said Cheryl Little, executive director of the Florida Immigrant 
Advocacy Center, referring to persistent government efforts to deport Joseph 
after he won an initial asylum claim. "He represents the extent to which 
advocates have to fight to save one life."

Joseph arrived in Key Biscayne in October 2002 on a boat laden with about 
200 Haitians who waded ashore in front of police and camera crews during 
rush hour. Newscasts depicted the refugees desperately trying to flag down 
cars and being rounded up by authorities.

Unlike most of the others, Joseph was granted asylum, which he lost on a 
government appeal. In the meantime, he spent seven months at Krome, the 
detention center west of Miami meant for adult detainees. Immigration 
authorities arrested him again in October 2003 after the Board of 
Immigration Appeals ordered him deported. On that occasion authorities 
guarded him in a hotel room.

Little said Joseph had been on "an emotional roller coaster" as his case 
moved through the courts and was diagnosed with severe post-traumatic stress 
disorder while in detention.

His age quickly became pivotal to his case. When he first arrived in South 
Florida, Joseph told interviewers he was only weeks shy of his 18th 
birthday, a date he later recanted. His birth certificate, which he had 
never seen, showed he was 16 when he arrived in the United States.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement based their initial assessment that 
Joseph was an adult on knee and wrist X-ray analyses that experts say have a 
margin of error of more than a year.

The Department of Homeland Security recognized Joseph as a juvenile in 
January 2004, allowing him to take his case to a state juvenile court and to 
apply for special immigration status as an abused, abandoned or neglected 
child. That application was denied, but 10 days ago the department reversed 
the denial, his lawyers said Monday, opening the way for a green card 
application. It must be filed before his 18th birthday on July 16.

"Today I'm happy. I'm too much happy," Joseph said at a news conference 
Monday, where he was flanked by Meek, lawyers and Haitian community leaders. 
Switching to Creole and speaking through a translator, he told reporters in 
a barely audible voice that he would like to master English and become a 
police officer or a mechanic.

Meek, meanwhile, accused the Homeland Security agency of "slowing the clock 
down," and "using every excuse possible" to delay Joseph's case.

"There are hundreds of kids, unfortunately, who are trying to escape the 
same plight ... who are not receiving a fair hearing, a fair process," he 
said.

Ruth Morris can be reached at rmorris@sun-sentinel.com or 954-356-4691.

Copyright © 2005, South Florida Sun-Sentinel