Roxana was protesting outside the Krome immigrant detention center in Miami when she got the call that her husband was finally getting his freedom after five long months of "torture" and uncertainty in immigration detention.
Maikel, a Cuban migrant who came to the U.S. in 2004, had been detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) since October. In that time, Roxana had been demonstrating with a group of women protesting the Trump administration's immigration detention policy.
"The first thing I did [when he was detained] was to create a group called 'Chinga la Migra' ('Screw ICE'). The group is made up of women whose husbands are detained and mothers whose children are locked up. We started organizing protests outside Alligator Alcatraz," Roxana told WLRN, in Spanish.
On the day of their most recent protest, her husband Maikel was released out of Krome following his transfer from Alligator Alcatraz. Now a week out from his release, Maikel is still shaken and doesn't feel free, he said. Maikel wears an ankle monitor, and is still in a state of legal limbo.
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" I'm not happy. Alligator Alcatraz was a place of torture. Psychological, physical and material torture," Maikel said in Spanish.
He and his wife asked WLRN not to share their full names out of fear of retaliation.
Maikel describes being chained hand and foot for daylong stretches, when he wasn't inside a holding cell with other detainees he likened to "monkey cages." He said he and others would have to ask loved ones over the phone — if they were allowed a phone call — what time it was, because there were no windows and no clocks in the facility.
He claims that guards at Alligator Alcatraz do not wear name tags, so when those same guards physically assault detainees, the detainees cannot identify them to issue a complaint.
Maikel is one of many immigrants held at Florida's Alligator Alcatraz detention center who claim to have experienced inhumane and violent conditions. WLRN reported last year on allegations of harsh punishments doled out to detainees.
"Florida Rising stands alongside a group of courageous women waging a relentless fight — day after day — demanding that immigration authorities release their loved ones: people held without legal basis, stripped of due process, and silenced behind walls of institutional violation of basic human rights," said Dian Alarcón, Miami Organizer and leader of the Immigration Campaign at nonprofit advocacy group Florida Rising.
According to data released by the Trump Administration, the majority of people in ICE detention do not have criminal records, despite the administration's claim that they are seeking to deport dangerous criminals.
Even for those detainees who do have charges in their past, advocates say the conditions in detention are unjust for those who have served their time.
As someone who has spent time in incarceration before, Maikel said even prison was preferable to immigrant detention. "The years I spent in prison were nothing compared to the five months I spent in that place," he said.
Criminal history
Maikel was incarcerated for 13 years on a felony charge from 2004. Though he was initially arrested and charged on counts of murder and robbery — crimes he claims he did not commit — the state ultimately declined to prosecute on those charges and instead convicted him for accessory to murder and sentenced him to 15 years in prison.
After serving his time in various institutions throughout Florida, Maikel was released and sought gainful employment. He became a supervisor at a gardening company, and he's been working for almost a decade with no further criminal charges on his record.
"I'm not a problem person. In this country, I work from Sunday to Sunday to push my family forward. Work comes first for me and then family," Maikel said.
Last October, during a court-mandated parole check-in, Maikel was told he was being detained.
" I heard about people being detained at court hearings, but I went because I wanted to do things the right way. I needed to renew my license and my work permit. When I got there, they told me they were going to revoke my paperwork and detain me," he said.
ICE attempted multiple times to deport Maikel to Mexico, flying him first to Texas where he told officials that he was Cuban and should not be deported to Mexico. He was returned to Alligator Alcatraz. Later, he was shipped west again, this time to California, and officials again tried to deport him to Mexico. Roxana got in touch with an immigration attorney in California who was able to secure Maikel a writ of habeas corpus and have him sent back to Miami.
Now that he's been released, Maikel is required to wear an ankle monitor. He has an upcoming hearing to decide if he can take it off.
Maikel has lost his job owing to his prolonged detention, and is now looking for work. In the meantime, Roxana has had to pay the rent for them and their 1-year-old child with help from her father.
Roxana said that the majority of migrants in detention are not criminal, and pointed out the irony that many staff at facilities like Krome are Hispanic migrants themselves. She said that people like her husband have served their debt to society, and a broad description of migrants as dangerous is unjust and inhumane.
"If someone made a mistake in the past, they've already served their time. It's not fair to categorize everyone as a criminal, she said.
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