Fernando Jaramillo Solano, his 12-year-old daughter, and his 15-year-old son were detained on October 27 by ICE agents in Durango. Immediately after the arrest, protesters tried to block vehicles from entering or exiting the ICE office in Bodo Park in Durango, to prevent ICE agents from removing the family.
The two-day-long protest ended in ICE agents pepper-spraying and shooting at demonstrators with rubber bullets.
The family was transferred to a detention center in Dilley, Texas.
According to a community statementreleased by Compañeros Four Corners Immigrant Resource Center this week, Jaramillo Solano signed paperwork for voluntary departure, and the family is awaiting removal.
At Tuesday night’s Durango City Council meeting, the children’s mother, Estella, testified that an immigration agent inappropriately touched her 12-year-old daughter during the October 27th detention. She called for an investigation and for her family to be released.
The council voted to open an inquiry into the circumstances of the arrests.
Advocates say the family is exhausted from the legal process, and their daughter is experiencing severe psychological distress in detention.
Enrique Orozco-Perez is the co-Executive Director of Compañeros Four Corners Immigrant Resource Center. He says Compañeros has been working with the family on an active asylum case since December 2024.
“In this case, and in many cases across the country, there are kids who are having their childhood ripped away from them and are going to have a lifetime of trauma that they're going to have to process. With this 12-year-old girl, and her brother, who's 15, they're not kids anymore. They've been forced to grow up and deal with a situation that they shouldn't have to be dealing with, especially given that they were doing it the legal way,” said Orozco-Perez.
Orozco-Perez says the emotional toll on him and community members has been very difficult.
“I'm Colombian, and this family was Colombian, and the Colombian community here is small, but we all know each other, and so we can feel that there's a void right now. We walk in fear, given the work we do, we don't feel safe in this career, in this profession, and we know that we're very exposed right now,” said Orozco-Perez.
Compañeros and activists are urging community members to keep contacting their congressional representatives and Governor Jared Polis, asking the Department of Homeland Security to review the family’s case, the allegations of misconduct, and “consider immediate release for humanitarian reasons.”
