ICE moves to deport Little Village father of 4 two weeks before Christmas

Authorities took Basilio Perez into custody after a residency marriage interview with his wife, a U.S. citizen.

SHARE ICE moves to deport Little Village father of 4 two weeks before Christmas
Basilio Perez (right), his wife Anabel Duran, and their four children at Perez’s birthday party last year. Immigration authorities have moved to deport Perez in the coming days.

Basilio Perez, right, his wife Anabel Duran and their four children at Perez’s birthday party last year. Immigration authorities have moved to deport Perez.

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Immigration authorities are preparing to a deport a Little Village man whose wife, a U.S. citizen, is 17 weeks pregnant.

Basilio Perez, a 36-year-old construction worker, was taken to Louisiana by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents Friday morning, his last stop in the United States before being deported to his native Mexico, his lawyer Victor Aparicio said.

Perez married Anabel Duran, 32, in August 2017 after three years of dating.

Duran has three children from a previous relationship and Perez is the primary caretaker of his son, Manuel. The couple have raised their children together in Little Village since 2016.

“My children’s father disappeared on us but [Perez] helped me raise them,” Duran said. “They all love him as if he were their father.”

In October, the couple walked into the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services regional field office in the Loop for a scheduled marriage interview. Duran hoped to fix Perez’s status and get him a green card.

After the interview, two ICE agents took Perez aside, Duran said. He never came back out.

Two days later, Duran found out she was pregnant.

“I didn’t hug him goodbye because I didn’t think they’d take him away like that. It felt like a trap,” she said.

Anabel Duran, right, and her four children outside Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s regional field office in the Loop on Wednesday.

Anabel Duran, right, and her four children outside Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s regional field office in the Loop on Wednesday.

Carlos Ballesteros/Sun-Times

Perez immigrated to the U.S. in 2001 and settled in Chicago.

Nine years later, police arrested Perez for felony drug possession. The charges were never prosecuted by the Cook County state’s attorney but they brought Perez in contact with ICE.

In August 2017, three weeks after marrying Duran, an immigration judge issued a deportation order for Perez stemming from the drug bust, an ICE spokesperson said.

Perez appealed the order in July 2018 but lost. He appealed it again a week after being detained in October to no avail.

Aparicio said he was surprised ICE didn’t use its discretion to postpone the deportation for a few months so Perez could take care of Duran during her pregnancy.

“We’re not asking for [Perez] to be released and stay forever — just long enough for him to be with his pregnant wife and prepare his family for his eventual deportation,” Aparicio said.

Duran, who works full time at a metal processing factory, is worried about what the next few months have in store for her family.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do once I’m too pregnant to work,” she said. “[Perez] helped with the rent and with the kids. Christmas is coming up. I’m depressed. I can’t eat. I’m worried about the baby. What am I going to do?”

ICE would not say when Perez will be deported. A spokesperson for Citizenship and Immigration Services said the agency doesn’t comment on specific cases.

Carlos Ballesteros is a corps member of Report for America, a not-for-profit journalism program that aims to bolster Sun-Times coverage of Chicago’s South Side and West Side.

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