“… Though he entered the United States legally at the San Diego border, appeared for an appointment the U.S. government gave him, and passed an initial credible fear interview, federal agents cited his tattoos—crowns reading “mom” and “dad”—as alleged proof of membership in the Tren de Aragua gang, something his lawyers continue to deny. He had no criminal record.
… In a televised
interview aired on Venezuelan state media Monday, Hernández Romero alleged sexual abuse by guards. “In my particular case, I was sexually abused by the same Salvadoran authorities who guarded us 24 hours a day, 7 days a week,” he said in Spanish. He added, “We believed we would never see our families again."
Hernández Romero elaborated on the treatment in a video interview produced by the Nicolás Maduro-aligned program
Con Maduro +. “I poured some water on myself, and they caught me,” Hernández Romero said. “They took me to solitary confinement and abused me. I was forced to perform oral sex on an officer. Three officers grabbed the batons and passed them over my private parts. And for me, that was just too devastating. It was my integrity as a human being, as a person of the [
LGBTQ+] community, that [brought me to my lowest point.]"
…. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security dismissed the abuse claims Tuesday, calling the deported men “criminal, illegal gang members,” according to the news agency.
…
Lindsay Toczylowski, ImmDef’s cofounder and CEO, told
The Advocate in a separate interview Monday that Hernández Romero’s case illustrated “a really dark foreshadowing of where we’re going as a country if this is allowed to stand.”
“These are people who were sent with no due process to be tortured, only to then be used as political pawns in a prisoner release that none of us were privy to before it happened, that none of them consented to being a part of,” she said.…”
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