30377: Hermantin(News) 2 supporters of detained Haitians on hunger strike (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>


Posted on Thu, Apr. 12, 2007

IMMIGRATION

2 supporters of detained Haitians on hunger strike

As Haitian migrants who arrived in Hallandale Beach wait in detention, two 
Haitian Americans went on a hunger strike, and Cuban Americans in Congress 
pressed for migrants to get their procedural rights.

BY TANIA VALDEMORO
tvaldemoro@MiamiHerald.com

Jetro Nelson, 25, of Little Haiti, has never starved. But on Wednesday the 
Haitian American decided to join his friend, Henry Petit Homme, 32, of Little 
Haiti, on a hunger strike at St. Paul Episcopal Church, to protest the 
detention and possible deportation of 101 Haitian migrants.

''The policy needs to change. People are being held at detention centers and 
being treated like prisoners. They are just refugees seeking a better life,'' 
said Nelson, a Realtor who works at the same firm with Homme.

Homme has been sleeping on a cot inside the church since April 4. He is 
subsisting only on water and Gatorade.

''I didn't think personally I could not eat for days, but I'm still here,'' 
said Homme, who arrived in Florida with his parents and sister by way of the 
Bahamas when he was 3. ``I want others to join me if they believe in the 
cause.''

Haitian leaders planned a hunger strike within days of the migrants' arrival at 
Hallandale Beach on March 28, but decided it was ''premature,'' said Marleine 
Bastien, executive director of Haitian Women of Miami. ``We realized we were 
making some inroads.''

Among the victories: U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services director Emilio 
González has given attorneys more time to prepare the Haitians for interviews 
with immigration authorities, to show they have a credible fear of returning to 
Haiti.

Four people have passed the credible-fear test in interviews, said immigration 
advocates.

The exception to the credible-fear test pertains to Cubans, who under the 
so-called wet foot/dry foot policy are generally allowed to stay if reach land. 
Cubans caught at sea usually are returned to the communist island.

The Haitian adults remain at the Broward Transitional Center in Pompano Beach, 
and 14 minors are at the Boystown shelter in Miami-Dade.

South Florida's three Cuban-American members of Congress -- U.S. Reps. Lincoln 
and Mario Díaz-Balart and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen -- sent Homeland Security 
Secretary Michael Chertoff a letter Tuesday urging the Bush administration to 
give the Haitian migrants ``access to proper legal representation.''

''These Haitians left their homeland in a desperate attempt to escape the 
horrendous political, social and economic conditions in Haiti,'' they wrote.

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