ICE has kept British family with their 3-month-old baby detained for days | Hacker News Reader

ICE has kept British family with their 3-month-old baby detained for days

washingtonpost.com

91 pointsprimroot73 comments

I don't know the full story here, but there's more going on than the family is claiming. The first thing the American border guards tried to do when this family "accidentally" entered the USA was to return them to Canada, but Canadian border officials denied them re-entry: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/british-columbia/arti...

They were also denied entry to the US on a prior occasion. Very strange indeed.

and they were carrying $16,000 in cash?

If you are going to some Apple Store, you need them, especially if you're looking for a Mac Pro

Why would you pay for a Mac Pro in cold hard cash?

has you ever asked yourself why those small-market/street-food owners drive a Mercedes AMG/Porsche? Do you think they paid using a Bank account?

On my daily routine I see plenty of people who magically drive luxury cars even with jobs that, on paper. would require probably ~50 years of more to accumulate the required amount of money to buy such a luxury.

Didn't know we criminalized cash.

You have to declare more than $10,000 IIRC when traveling over the border. When taken into account with all the other suspicious activity, it's worth a mention.

If that's per adult they're below the limit.

It's per family (residing in one household).

http://customsandinternationaltradelaw.com/2013/12/13/intern...

There were two families.

actually over $10k without declaring it. But the point is that they were not tourists that got lost. Tourists carry credit cards and all. Why would they be carrying $16,000 (USD, unless it was the equivalent of it) if they're staying in CA?

It would be (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/31/5316) in that amount, but that isn't my point.

The point is that the totality of their actions are not supporting their story very well.

Basically, yes?

Not that I agree with it, but cash definitely can be considered criminal in large amounts. Having a few hundred to a few thousand is enough to be arrested in the US, assuming you're not protected by celebrity.

We don't (and shouldn't), but I don't know of very many people who go on vacation with $16k of it. Like what the hell were they gonna spend that on? A pallet of novelty keychains?

Since I couldn’t reply to the guy who didn’t know we “criminalized cash”... $16,000 specifically is an issue because crossing the border with any amount of cash over $10k has to be disclosed. If you don’t, it’s considered like contraband.

No problem if you disclose and explain what it’s for, and in some cases can explain where it came from.

This is a basic money laundering protection policy almost every country I’ve gone through has similar.

It was supposedly Canadian money so I think that's less suspicious, than if they accidentally wandered into America with US dollars.

That's probably what contributed to the situation spiraling out of control. Once there is one denial, every other attempted entry is going to be scrutinized and questioned quite a bit more. Not that at all justifies their treatment.

> Vancouver when an animal ventured into the road, forcing them to make an unexpected detour.

> U.S. authorities disputed the family’s version of events, saying they were spotted via video surveillance “slowly and deliberately driving through a ditch onto Boundary Road in Lynden

Well if they were driving through a ditch it would have to be slow and deliberate, especially with a baby in car. I wonder if the same video surveillance saw this animal too. It would have to be a moose or a bear presumably. Wonder if they were following Google or Apple maps direction. Hopefully there is a big red warning there to not send people on detours via international borders.

> “Attempts were made to return the individuals to Canada, however, Canada refused to allow their return and two attempts to contact the United Kingdom consulate were unsuccessful,”

It's a bureaucratic hell. US authorities claim they tried to send them to Canada which refused to take them back. But also they tried to contact UK consulate, which also somehow didn't work. At the same time the family say they couldn't contact UK authorities. I think they wanted to be the ones making the call but were denied.

The biggest animal in that area would be a deer, or possibly an elk a looooong way from home. Either one would run away.

Moose don't live that far South, and the bears stay near the mountains, which are vary far away from Boundary road near Lynden. But of course non-locals wouldn't know this, so they wouldn't realize how preposterous it sounds when they spin their tale to the police.

What? I saw a moose standing in a pond in Idaho, south of the 49th parallel, and there are bears all over the Pacific northwest.

Cow?

> Moose don't live that far South

There are meese all over the northern US, which is - last I checked - south of Canada. I encountered two (a mother and her calf) when hiking in the Tetons as a kid, and apparently there are a bunch in Northern Nevada.

If CA won't let them back in, they are out of legal status in both the US and CA. There is no legal option except to send them back to their country of origin.

But why not. They were let in there to begin with? With a visa or some other border crossing procedure. I don’t see why they couldn’t take them in. Did they break Canadian law by crossing into US by accident, I don’t think they did.

Having read that, I'd agree with you.

The full article has a lot more details. Not buying the family's story at all that they just got lost. They had 16k in cash, were previously rejected from US entry, etc.

Not excusing the alleged conditions of their detainment, but from what's given in the article I see nothing amiss in how they were apprehended and scheduled for deportation.

The Daily Mail has more details. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7577113/Border-offi...

The Daily Mail is a tabloid and should never be cited.

This looks to be very much a tabloid story. It looks like The Sun and The New York Post had the story a day before the Washington Post.

"The Connors family says it didn’t plan to be on the unmarked road. The two couples and their three young children were driving near the U.S.-Canada border on Oct. 3 during a visit to Vancouver when an animal ventured into the road, forcing them to make an unexpected detour."

"U.S. authorities disputed the family’s version of events, saying they were spotted via video surveillance “slowly and deliberately driving through a ditch onto Boundary Road in Lynden, Washington” between parallel roadways on the U.S. and Canadian sides. The roads are not connected by cross streets, and the only legal way to traverse between the countries is at staffed border stations throughout the region."

I lived for many years in Vancouver, and there is no road connecting Canada and the USA without a checkpoint until you hit the logging roads in the Rockies (a 3 hour drive East). It's not possible to cross over to Boundary road without driving off-road.

Right about here it looks like you could drive across a ditch and into America, no apparent fence.

245-255 E Boundary Rd

https://goo.gl/maps/a3fvQ5Xd7J71mkx7A

Yes, you can cross via a ditch.

I could totally see someone thinking this was a divided highway and saying "Oh shit I'm on the wrong side of the road." Especially since in the UK a double-yellow line marks a curb (specifically what in the US would be called a "no standing zone") rather than dividing the centre of the road.

So there is a plausible (if stupid) reason why they might have crossed, but things are still suspicious.

I am confused, they are angry what the American government has done to them.

What were they supposed to do. Canada will not let them reenter, they had been denied entry to the US so it is not like they were going to just release them to run around the US after illegally entering, and the UK is being slow about the deportation. The family is still together and they didn't remove the child. Were they supposed to be put in a 5 star hotel?

People complain about the condition when they illegally cross into the US (I am from southern Texas and have a lot of exposure to this), but just image the conditions if you got caught illegally crossing into say Russia, or China, or Iran.

I think the point is that some of us don't like the US turning into Russia, China, or Iran.

This type of stuff has been standard procedure for decades.

EU citizens discovered to be out of status are routinely sent to the nearest detention center until they can get a flight home. There usually isn't any 'legal process' if the detainee voluntarily departs.

It would appear there is a lot more to the story than the headlines imply.

For example evidence disputes their account of how they ended up in the US and the fact that they previously tried to enter the US and were denied for reasons not fully clear. I’m ignoring the sensationalist headlines for now until the full story comes out.

ICE may have some challenges but they’re not just rounding up nice wholesome British families and throwing them in the slammer for no reason.

"British" is quite a wide spectrum these days.

Nope, just the nice wholesome Mexican families.

Not to say that it's okay to detain people with an infant in reportedly (and believably) poor conditions this long but the whole story is very strange.

They took a different road to avoid an animal? Was there a grizzly attacking their car or something? Then the Canadians refused to allow them back. Suspicious to say the least.

From https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-50067575:

"David Connors, 30, and his wife Eileen, 24, said they were travelling with their young baby and family members - two more adults and young twins - on 3 October when, to avoid an animal, they veered on to a small road.

But CBP said that remote video surveillance captured the vehicle crossing a ditch before pulling back on to a road in Lynden, Washington state, and continuing west. The group was pulled over by a border patrol agent shortly after.

The occupants were arrested for illegally entering the US without inspection. During processing, records revealed the two adults that had previously been denied access to the US, CBP said on Tuesday."

If it’s not ok to detain them, what are the border guards supposed to do? Release them into the country and just hope that they show up for their hearing?

Did they have a return flight back to UK from Canada?

If true, why were they carrying $16k, and was it USD or CAD?

Obviously Canada's alleged refusal to re-admit them needs an official statement (and explanation) too, why did WaPo not follow that up?

Are their identities real?

I guess only the courts will flush out anything even resembling the actual course of events in this post-truth era.

Stop pushing this story with this ridiculously click-baited title. More like "ICE detains family crossing border illegally with $16k in cash, previously denied entry".

While it is very suspicious what's happened, I've ridden with people who have inadvertently offloaded on to bike paths and continued to drive as if nothing was wrong.

Canada would not accept them and their previous Visa waivers to the US got denied. There is more to this than the clickbait title let’s on.

From everything being described this looks like an entire waste of money moving them around to different places and housing them. Have you ever seen the government run something effectively ?

How would you have done this more efficiently?

Expedited court hearing before a magistrate?

This is an administrative process, getting the courts involved would make it less efficient, if anything.

How the frick do you accidentally drive into the US?

This is the road in question:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/245-255+E+Boundary+Rd,+Lyn...

Now imagine a discussion with your wife, "Am I driving on the right side of the road", and ...

Given the consequences of crossing the border, and the expense they went through to install border cameras you'd THINK they'd put up a small fence, or at least SOME marker.

Nope.

That road is crazy, especially for an international border. Mind you, it's not as bad as the Irish border, as the only way to determine you've crossed that is that Google maps changes its units.

You can see a border marker (grey obelisk) if you switch to the street view on your map.

Where ? I can't seem to find such an obelisk even for more than a few hundred meters forward.

I am on mobile, if I open your URL and hit "street view" I am looking in the opposite direction from the marker, I need to turn 180 to see it from that point. If I scroll the street view next to the marker it shows the address "256 E Boundary road".

Ah. Wow. That looks like it belongs in a Marklin set. At the risk of agreeing with Trump, I do think a small fence would have been better here.

Hell, would Border Patrol object if I drove over there with a 24-pack and some buddies and at least put some cones or reflective posts or something down? Maybe tie them together with lengths of rope or twine? Or rocks? Or shrubberies? Or little signs with the Canadian flag facing the US side and the US flag facing the Canadian side?

Looks like there are even power poles there already. Maybe hang flags off the power lines (or maybe an extra non-powered line or rope below the power lines)? Or banners that say "INTERNATIONAL BORDER"?

Ooooo, or we could paint the US road blue with white stars all over it, and the Canada road white with red maple leaves all over it.

Non-paywalled reporting from The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/oct/15/uk-family-ar...

Unfortunately, the Guardian article is missing some information from the Washington Post link. Chiefly, that Canada rejected their return and the suspicious behaviour reported by US officers.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50067575

And the fact they’d been denied entry

You’re right, thanks for pointing that out

Not missing, selectively withheld.

Including the full story reduces the clickbait. Many stories are presented in a way to create outrage, not actually present the story accurately.

It's curious how some people are the target of more outrage bait than others.

The globe and mail were unable to confirm any of this, which is weird. It's also VERY unusual for a country to let tourists in and not have them back in this situation.

It’s unclear how long they had been in Canada for. Maybe the Canadian border service also flagged them as a risk for illegal immigration?

Although it seems to only include the family's account of events.

I've been nodding to many Guardian exposé, environmental, and social-justice stories the last couple of years, but felt they'd started to go too far recently. This is indicative, to me.

If I over stayed my visa in most of Europe, especially in Turkey or Russia why would you expect a different outcome?

If you break the law there are consequences - welcome to the real world...

Why is such treatment being dolled out to citizens on other countries,wasn't this baby seperation thing only reserved for Mexicans and those who crossed form the south.

Officers separate kids from adults committing a crime. i.e. if someone was stealing a car and had a child beside them - the child would be separated after the arrest. In the same way when someone comes to the country illegally they are committing a crime and kids are separated to ensure their safety. It has nothing to do with "being Mexican".

The baby never separated from the mother. Only the father was separated from the two. And reading the other comments, it sounds like this family aren't being entirely truthful with their story.

If only ICE/CBP could release the video where they caught them trespassing.

Feels like the family wants to gain emotional support through three months old child saga.

I side solely with ICE in this particular case, that they didn't simply offer a 'Return back' option. Common, if ICE starts to do that - there will be a handful flux of people giving it a try hoping that if they were caught - they can simply return back.

Expecting a catered service in the detention center is overboard. Government run facilities, over-crowded all the time, they got a family detention center, not an ordinary one itself should make them feel safer. I am assuming the British family is trying to use the white privilege.

Whole 16K cash in hand story and two families blah blah - there is way more to the story.

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