Recognized in Death: How Undocumented Immigrants Are Buried

[AlphaCentauri]

On a muggy summer night in 2005, an undocumented Mexican immigrant named Juan Romano was bludgeoned to death by two teenagers in Sunset Park.

Having no ID, his body was taken to the city morgue and given six months before being buried at Potter’s Field alongside 800,000 nameless indigent dead. Nine days later, Romano’s cousin — who learned of his murder after spotting a sketch of his face in a newspaper — tracked down his remains.

Romano was issued a death certificate and a visa allowing the transport of his body back to Mexico.

It was the only time the American government ever acknowledged his existence — a grim reality shared by countless undocumented Latino immigrants who have lived and died in this city and throughout America.

“The greatest irony of this was that in dying he was finally given a piece of paper,” said Artemio Guerra, who helped Romano secure a proper funeral through his work at the Fifth Avenue Committee, a Brooklyn-based nonprofit. “It’s the only documentation he ever got, and it was used to take his body across the border.”

Each year in America the bodies of thousands of undocumented Central and South American immigrants are loaded onto cargo planes and sent south for burial. In 2008 alone, the Mexican Consulate in New York City issued visas to and sent home 389 bodies.

So far this year they have repatriated 99.

“Family members generally have no understanding of how the system works here … they don’t feel at home,” said Guerra. “The result is that they almost always send the body back to their homeland.”

http://www.brooklyneagle.com/categories/category.php?category_id=27&id=27840

[Kali]

1. stupid games over paper

People's lives are affected. All for paper - permission to move, permission to walk over an arbitrary line, permission to work to take care of themselves because you have to have those pieces of green paper to survive in the modern global economy.

[Demeter]

2. Okay, I Am Trying Really Hard To Figure Out Why I Should Feel Guilted

since had I gone off to a foreign land without proper documentation, I would deserve whatever I got.

Nations exist for the welfare of their citizens. This is not a new concept.

[Kali]

4. I know it is difficult but TRY to step back from your petty selfish perspective

and THINK about what you are saying. Do you really think these people are coming here without documents because they are on some kind of lark? Do you really think they WANT to leave their country, homes, and families to come work in the kind of hostile environment demonstrated by your attitude? Are you really that clueless? Do you have ANY idea what causes them to do this? The policies and economic drivers? Do you realize that WE ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM?

[AlphaCentauri]

7. try this link

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=3845822&mesg_id=3845822

[Coyote_Bandit]

3. Those who choose

to come into a country illegally should have no expectation of legal documentation. Their choice.

There are legal means to enter the country with documentation. The requirements are less onerous than many of the immigration requirements of other nations. Most any American that has made an effort to immigrate can testify to the difficulties. If you don't have tons of money, far more education than most, language skills and a job awaiting your chances of immigrating are considerably reduced.

I personally am acquainted with some Americans who do some damn dirty, dangerous work that requires long hours and comparatively little compensation given the circumstances. Anyone who thinks illegal workers do work that Americans won't do is insulting these hardworking citizens. Or they are ignorant. Or they presume that no one else would do the work that they personally are unwilling to do.

[Kali]

5. Choose?

CHOOSE? You make it sound like somebody was deciding whether to wear a jacket on a spring evening or not. The choice is closer to one of life and death. Survival. Jeebus it's hard to see so many cold hearted "progressives" say this kind of shit.

[Coyote_Bandit]

6. Perhaps

I have a bit of a different perspective because I have a very dear friend who has spent over 20 years living and working with a humanitarian group in Mexico teaching the people to work and live independently in their own country. Most of them do not even make the effort. Soon after they finish their course of study they come here. They CHOOSE to come.