Pleas from family at rally

As Janelie Rodriguez’s family and allies gathered outside the Hays County Jail on Friday to plead for her release, a bus belonging to La-Salle Corrections — a private prison firm that runs the West Texas Detention Center for Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — pulled away from the jail, silhouettes of detainees visible through the bus’s tinted windows.

Rodriguez, a 25-year-old DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) recipient from Buda, was taken to a mental health facility in Kerrville on Oct. 29, 2017, after her family called police for a mental health check on her. On Jan. 17, a neighbor called the police when Rodriguez had another mental health episode. The police arrested her on a warrant from the October incident, when she allegedly bit a police officer. She had been in the Hays County Jail since then. According to Hays County court records, Rodriguez faced two felony charges of assault on a public servant, one misdemeanor charge of resisting arrest and one misdemeanor charge of evading arrest. In June, Judge Bill Henry ordered a psychological report on Rodriguez and then, on July 11, dismissed the felony charges against her. County Court-at Law Judge David Glickler ordered Rodriguez released with time served for the misdemeanor charges. However, she remained in Hays County custody because ICE had placed an immigration hold on her the day of her arrest. She was picked up and taken to Austin earlier on Friday to await her eventual transfer to the South Texas Detention Center in Pearsall.

Local grassroots immigrant rights group Mano Amiga is working with Rodriguez’s family to get her released to her family. Mano Amiga held a press conference in front of the Hays County Sheriff’s Office on Friday to tell Rodriguez’s story and ask the public for support.

“My daughter is sick,” Rodriguez’s mother Jeannette Rodriguez told reporters in Spanish as she asked the public for help in getting her daughter home. She said she is worried for her daughter and has been praying.

A spokesman for the Hays County Sheriff’s Office said he could not discuss whether Janelie Rodriguez received any mental health treatment while in custody because of confidentiality issues. Jeannette Rodriguez said that her daughter, who needs medications for her mental health issues, did eventually receive treatment.

“While she was incarcerated at Hays County Jail she had no treatment for the first few months,” Jeannette Rodriguez said. “She was there almost six months total. In the beginning, when I went to see her she looked bad. She had been hallucinating and imagining things. But the last month in jail she told me they were giving her treatment and that she felt better with that treatment. While in jail, she was also given albuterol, because she suffers from an illness in her respiratory tract.”

Jeannette Rodriguez said the last time she spoke with her daughter, she seemed to be calm but afraid.

Janelie’s stepfather, Delfino Vaca, spoke as well, telling the crowd that if she is deported, she will be sent to Mexico, where she doesn’t know anyone or what conditions will be like.

“The police treated her like a criminal when she had psychological problems,” he said.

Karen Muñoz from Mano Amiga said that Senate Bill 4 puts Hays County Sheriff Gary Cutler in the position of having to honor ICE detainers, but that Cutler has a reputation for honoring every ICE detainer he receives.

Of Janelie’s situation, Muñoz said, “She had psychological issues that should have been dealt with in a different way.

Muñoz said that ICE has been known to not provide adequate medical care in its detention facilities, so it is unclear whether Rodriguez will receive the treatments she needs while in ICE custody. (Last year, Felipe Abonza Lopez, a DACA recipient from San Marcos, had been detained without being charged with anything and sent to the ICE detention center in Pearsall. Lopez, an amputee, said that he was not given medical care while in custody even though his prosthetic was causing him pain.)

“The only thing we can do is continue to fight for her release, even from Pearsall,” Muñoz said.

“Please help us get my daughter home,” Jeannette Rodriguez said. “Please help us.”

Muñoz said that Mano Amiga had put an attorney in touch with Rodriguez’s family and would “seek out all options” to pursue Rodriguez’s release.