Yale Law Students Request Temporary Release of Pregnant Immigrant

Yale Law Students Request Temporary Release of Pregnant Immigrant
BY: Lucy Nalpathanchil - Mon, 05/05/2008 - 16:

Woman who fled Sierra Leone will be placed in immigration detention this week




Mahawa Conde and her son, Fode: Photo courtesy of Michael TanYale Law School students are representing an immigrant who may give birth while being held in a federal detention facility.



35-year-old Mahawa Conde fled Sierre Leone in 1998. She settled in Maryland where she met her husband and lived with their two children.



Her attorney, Yale Law student, Michael Tan, says the school's legal clinic decided to represent Conde because her circumstances are far from ordinary.



"Namely describing her experiences of sex slavery during the Sierra Leonean civil war, her forcible genital mutilation and also the fact she is very pregnant right now in FCI Danbury."



Conde is at the Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury on a theft conviction. She completes her six month sentence this week.



But Tan says she overstayed her visa and her application seeking asylum was never completed.



So, Immigration and Customs Enforcement or ICE has a detainer on Conde which means she'll be turned over to federal custody. Tan says ICE may consider Conde's expired visa and theft conviction as grounds for deportation.
She's expected to give birth May 16.



Tan and his co-counsel have asked ICE to grant Conde temporary supervised release, allowing her to have her baby outside of detention and spend time with her family before returning to ICE custody.



Her husband, Thierno Camera, is also an immigrant who was granted asylum in the US from Guinea.
Camera says his wife's absense is especially hard for his young children



"You told me, 'Mommy was going to come at Christmas, we didn't see Mommy. I said, Mommy was busy but I promise you Mother's Day, she will be here.' "



ICE Spokeswoman, Paula Grenier would not provide specifics on Conde other than to confirm she will be turned over to ICE this week.



Grenier says ICE treats all detainees fairly and takes into consideration humanitarian requests.



When asked whether ICE has granted temporary supervised release to other detainees based on humanitarian grounds, Grenier replied, "every day."



UPDATE: 5-6-08



Federal immigration authorities have agreed to temporarily release a pregnant woman from Sierra Leone who was living in the US on an expired visa. 35-year-old Mahawa Conde had been serving a six-month sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury on a theft conviction. She was scheduled to be transferred to Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody yesterday because she had been living in the country illegally. But attorneys at Yale's legal clinic asked ICE to grant Conde temporary release because she's due to give birth next Friday and because of medical complications that stemmed from sexual abuse she suffered in her native Sierra Leone. Her attorney, Michael Tan says Conde will be allowed to be with her family for three months. In an email statement, ICE spokeswoman Paula Grenier told WNPR that Conde will be ordered to appear at a later date relating to her immigration status. Grenier said that ICE routinely makes decisions based on humanitarian concerns.



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