Criminal - Sanctuary

Episode Date: May 7, 2021

After 32 years in the United States, José Chicas was told he had to leave. He bought a plane ticket to El Salvador, but then a local church offered another option. Special thanks to Jackie Metivier. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop.  Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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I would always keep the door open. Y ponía una silla acá. And put a chair here. Para ver por allá y para acá. So that I could be able to watch from both sides. That's why I figured I'll keep an eye out. I'll have a chance to run inside. Sometimes I would see a car that I wouldn't recognize and then run inside and peek through the blinds to see who they were.

We met with Jose Chicas a few weeks ago in Durham, North Carolina. He felt more comfortable speaking with us in Spanish, so you'll hear the voice of Jackie Mativier as our interpreter. We met in a part of town called Walltown, not far from Duke University, on Onslow Street, on the property of St. John's Missionary Baptist Church. You lived here? Si. St. John's Missionary Baptist Church is a big, red-brick church on a very residential street. Next to it is a small building. It looks like a house.

But it seems like it's had a lot of functions over the years. Classes, meet-ups, after-school programs. Jose took us inside. There were bookcases everywhere, desks, a lot of furniture. This was where I slept for almost one year, on this couch here. Did you miss the seatbelt? Yes. I slept with the child because they hadn't brought me a bed.

My son and I slept on this couch because we didn't have a bed. After a year I moved into this room. This used to be like a library. I see that all of the blinds are drawn now. Is this how it was most of the time you were here? Sí. Sí, pero a veces las abrías, pero a veces como entraba la claridad. Sometimes I would open them, but mostly they were closed. At first, José Chicas never left this building. He was too afraid.

Eventually, he would let himself step out onto the front porch, still safe on church property. And then, after a year, he says he began to feel safe enough to go into the yard to plant flowers and spruce things up. He says he spent most of his time watching, trying to keep an eye on everything, every person or car he didn't recognize. When his wife Sandra would bring meals, they'd sit together inside with the blinds drawn. Jose Chicas had to stay here on this property or else get out of the country immediately.

I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. Jose Chicas had been in the United States for 32 years when he was told to leave. He and his wife Sandra have three sons and a daughter. What did you tell him to do? Do you remember him saying, I think I have to go back to El Salvador? Yes. Yes, he told me, he said, I have to leave. I don't have no choice. But I'm the kind of person that's looking for help. This is Jose's wife, Sandra Marquina.

They got married in the late 90s and made their home in Raleigh, North Carolina. For years, Jose had work permits. He worked as a custodian and a maintenance worker and as a dishwasher in restaurants. Sandra works in the housekeeping department at North Carolina State University. Jose would drive to Charlotte for mandatory check-ins at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency. And then, in the spring of 2017, he arrived for his check-in and was told to buy a plane ticket and leave the country.

Sandra remembers that he called her from the ICE facility. She was sure he was kidding. I said, are you joking? Are you saying something? Because he liked to joke. And he said, no, Sandra, they give me deportation order. Then when they started everything confusing, and I say, I want you to stay here, but because we have been living together for almost 29 years. And that's what I'm looking for, help and pray.

I believe in pray, but pray and looking for help, and that's what I'm doing. So the options were go back to El Salvador where you didn't have a life anymore or stay here with the threat of being thrown into a deportation center or jail. Sí. José bought a plane ticket. He didn't see any other option. He was scheduled to leave on June 27th. Sandra got very busy trying everything she could think of to keep her husband here. There was a rally in downtown Raleigh, and we went, my wife and my 10-year-old boy at the time,

and they gave him the mic. He said he didn't want to be separated from his dad. Here's Ezequiel Chicas. He's 14 now. I didn't really understand none of it. I was 10. It just all came really fast. There was a chance that my father had to move away to a whole other country. It was very confusing at that time. At the rally, he told the crowd that his father was scheduled to be deported the day before his fifth grade graduation.

He said, I hope you can help me with my father not leaving me. I do remember very clear the day he spoke. He say, he not only speak by himself, he speak for other children. He say this word, I'm too young for stay, stay away to my parents.

He said children for our youngest age, they need a parent. I do remember that. He said, they're really making me feel proud. Muy triste. It was very, very sad. We all cried. In fact, the whole community cried with us. There were so many people. One of those people was Reverend William Barber II, the former leader of the North Carolina NAACP.

He'd never met the family before, but was moved hearing Ezekiel speak. Sandra remembers the lady saying to her that Reverend Barber was offering them sanctuary. And Sandra said, what does that mean? Here's Jose. And Reverend Barber said, you will stay. You do not have to go. We will find you protection in a church. And this was three weeks before I was supposed to leave.

What was the conversation like with your wife, with your family, when you realized that this was the only option for you to safely stay in this country, that you would have to go away, you'd have to hide? Muy difícil. It was very, very hard. See, I didn't want to go into hiding, and I already had a ticket to leave, but we sat down, and I talked to my family, and I talked to other church members, and we were hoping that maybe the president would change his mind about the orders, and maybe that I would not spend too much time in sanctuary. The modern sanctuary movement originated in the 1980s, during civil wars in El Salvador and Guatemala. In July 1980, a group of Salvadorans became stranded after crossing into the Sonoran Desert in Arizona.

Thirteen died, and those who survived were evacuated and brought to local hospitals. Immigration officials announced that once they'd recovered, they'd be deported back to El Salvador. It was all over the news. Many people, including a number of church leaders, argued that the Salvadorans should be allowed to apply for asylum under the Refugee Act of 1980,

which held that if a person could prove that they had a well-founded fear of persecution, they could qualify for asylum status in the U.S. When it became clear that the hospitalized Salvadorans would not be allowed to apply for asylum, members of the local religious community came together, and by March of 1982, six congregations in Arizona and California

declared themselves sanctuaries. More and more churches followed suit. By the mid-1980s, there were hundreds that identified as sanctuaries. Some of the church leaders were charged with conspiracy to violate federal law and harboring, transporting, aiding, and abetting undocumented men, women, and children. Church leaders argued that religious congregations have always offered refuge and protection to those in need, since ancient Rome. It's in the Bible.

During the Middle Ages, people were said to be safe, even from the king, when they passed through the gates of a monastery. According to an ICE memo from 2011, churches, synagogues, mosques, and other buildings rented for religious purposes, along with hospitals and schools, are described as, quote, sensitive locations where ICE agents, theoretically, would not pursue deportations.

So when Jose Chicas got the offer to stay in a church building in 2017, he thought he would be safe. On the night before he went into sanctuary, Jose says he and his family got Chinese food, his favorite. They wanted to be together. He didn't know how long he'd be away. Do you remember the last night that he was at home before coming here and what that was like? Yes, it was very, it was a lot of emotions. It was emotions, hoping that he wouldn't be there,

he wouldn't be here for a long time. Jose's son, Ezekiel. Like, hopefully it would just, like, happen in a couple months, but, like, barely anyone could sleep that night because they know that it was going to be the last time that he was going to be there for a while. How long did you think that you would be in sanctuary? What were you telling yourself? What was your family thinking, how long you'd have to be in sanctuary?

I told them I'm only going to be there for three months. Subtle results. Still you, but with fewer lines. Botox Cosmetic, autobotulinum toxin A, is a prescription medicine used to temporarily make moderate to severe frown lines, crow's feet, and forehead lines look better in adults. Effects of Botox Cosmetic may spread hours to weeks after injection causing serious symptoms. Alert your doctor right away as difficulty swallowing, speaking, breathing, eye problems, or muscle weakness may be a sign of a life-threatening condition. Thank you. Tell your doctor about medical history, muscle or nerve conditions including ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease, myasthenia gravis, or Lambert-Eden syndrome in medications, including botulinum toxins, as these may increase the risk of serious side effects.

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His investigation takes him on a journey involving homicide detectives, ghost hunters, and even psychic mediums, and leads him to a dark secret about his own family. Check out Ghost Story, a series essential pick, completely ad-free on Apple Podcasts. Jose Chicas went into sanctuary on June 27, 2017, to avoid being deported to El Salvador, where he was born and had grown up. He'd been in the United States for more than 30 years. Why did you decide to come to the U.S.? Well, there was a civil war going on in my country, and all the youth were in a lot of trouble. There were many gangs asking you to join them, and my mom was very scared.

She didn't want me to die, so I left. I really didn't want to come, but I didn't want to create problems for my mother, so I ended up coming. What do you mean, problems for your mother? Well, I mean that my mother worried a lot. I was only 17 or 18 years old, and she was afraid that they would kill me. Tell me a little bit more about that, about what it was like in El Salvador, what type of dangers you were up against and what daily life was like? Well, there was a guerrilla in the military. In fact, I was in the military for 18 months, and my mom would tell me that members of the guerrilla would come around the house asking,

when is your son coming back? We want him to join us. So she thought it would be best for me to leave. But you didn't want to come? No. Because you'd be leaving your friends, your family, your home, everything you knew. My wife here is laughing because she's always said that I had girlfriends. Oh, you didn't want to leave girlfriends. Is that true? No, I liked it a lot. I enjoyed being in the military and I wanted to stay there.

On February 6, 1985, Jose said goodbye to his mother and left home on foot. By this point, he was almost 20 years old. He traveled for days. He says he hired someone who could help smuggle him over the U.S. border. They headed for Brownsville, the southernmost city in Texas, along the Gulf Coast. Well, I crossed the border and got to Brownsville, but immigration caught me, and I thought they were going to deport me, so I was happy. But my sister, who was in Houston, called my mother,

and my mother said, do everything you can to get him to stay there. Jose's sister hired an attorney and was able to get Jose released on bail. The attorney told him there would be a hearing later and Jose would be expected to show up. But Jose says the attorney didn't think it was a good idea. That attorney said if he presents himself at the immigration office, they will deport him. So the attorney said the solution is to change your address and change your name. Did you change your name? No, I never changed my name. So at this point,

once you've, basically the lawyer was kind of saying, if you show up, if we fight this, they will deport you. So your best option to stay in the United States is to change your name, change your address and kind of go on the run. Is that right? Uh-huh, sí. So at 20 years old, you're told that if you want to stay here, and you might have wanted to go back to El Salvador, but if you were going to be in this country, it meant that you were going to be doing it every day,

knowing that at any moment someone could send you back. Si. En el 89. In 1989, I was planning to go back to El Salvador because I told my sister, I don't feel like I'm, I don't want to live like I'm in hiding, like, you know, watching my back. But she said, you have to remember that the war is terrible back home. So in 1989, I decided to come to North Carolina. We had heard that Chinese restaurants were hiring,

and it was easier at that time. Do you like Chinese food? Oh, yes. Mucho. You're not sick of it? Nunca. Never. Me gusta. You're not sick of it? Nunca. Never. Me gusta.

My wife knows I love Chinese. If you had to pick El Salvadorian food or Chinese food as your last meal, which would it be? China. Muy deliciosa. With the help of an attorney, Jose applied for political asylum. Jose was able to get a work permit, a social security number,

and a driver's license. He started paying taxes. He met Sandra Marquina. He used to call me, my name is Sandra, right? He used to call me Sandrita, mi niña, and stuff like that. Sandra is also from El Salvador and arrived in the U.S. when she was 17. We met in 1991. Her brother was working at the same Chinese restaurant,

and he showed me a picture one time, and ever since I saw it, she's the one that came after me. Jose and Sandra moved in together and eventually settled in Raleigh, North Carolina. Tell me about the life that you built for yourself in Raleigh once you got to North Carolina and met Sandra? What was your life like? Well, at the time, I was drinking a lot of alcohol and doing drugs, and we stayed together for 10 years in that lifestyle. In 1993, he got a DUI and was sentenced to 12 months probation. A few years later, he was charged with misdemeanor assault

and sentenced to two years probation. In 2002, I decided to join a church and let God enter my heart, and that changed our lives. We have been a very happy married couple. And then, in 2004, Jose's political asylum status was revoked. They said I did not qualify anymore because the war was over in my country. But you had made your whole life here. Now I didn't want to go, because I had a life here.

The gangs were very bad in El Salvador, and I did not want to bring my own sons into this situation. He was able to secure work permits and apply for and receive staves of removal on his deportation order. But everything was always provisional, and he had to travel to ICE facilities to check in. Sandra says it seemed like the check-ins were simple. They just wanted to make sure he was following the rules, check up on his work permits.

Jose was ordained and became the pastor at a small evangelical church in Raleigh. His kids were doing well in school, and for more than a decade, he would check in, and ICE seemed content to leave him be. But then, in 2017, everything changed. The president on Twitter today claiming the recent crackdown on undocumented immigration is, quote, keeping a campaign promise. ICE agents have been rounding up hundreds in deportation raids across the country.

In states along the U.S.-Mexico border, swift reaction to the Trump administration's sweeping new rules on immigration. Deportation! I was very surprised. I went for a check-in to the Tivola Center, the ICE Tivola Center, and I was surprised when they said, you don't qualify anymore. There has been an executive order by Trump, and now you are considered a criminal, and you have to go.

Hisasi was told that it was because he hadn't reported for his court hearing back in 1985, when he first arrived in the country. The one his lawyer told him was risky to show up to. So because in 1985, before you had gotten the asylum, you had disappeared from that initial, they were going all the way back to 1980, even though you had been checking in at ICE and doing what had been asked of you. It was that thing that happened when you were 19 years old that was now making you a criminal. Sí. José doesn't know for sure,

but he thinks the DUI and assault charges from the 90s may have fast-tracked his deportation when President Trump came into office. Yes, they took away my work permit, my driver's license, my social security number, and on that date, June 27, 2017, they said, you have to go. Hey, it's Scott Galloway. And on our podcast, Pivot, we are bringing you a special series about the basics of artificial intelligence. We're answering all your questions.

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Just weeks before his time ran out, Jose and his family went to a rally, the rally where they met Reverend William Barber, who offered Jose sanctuary. Many community members and local religious leaders got involved, and on June 27, 2017, the same day his flight back to El Salvador took off, Jose moved into a small parish building at St. John's Missionary Baptist Church in Durham.

He brought photographs and clothes. What was your daily routine like? How did you keep yourself not from losing your mind, being stimulating yourself? Well, now I sit down and I realize, I think I made it through all that time here alone because God helped me. I didn't go crazy. This was an abandoned house when I came here. In fact, through this wall right here, where you can see, there used to be a hole where the squirrels would come into the house. I would spend endless nights crying, not sleeping. And then I figured I have to clean and paint this

house and pray and read the Bible. And that's what got me through it. So how often were you able to see your family? Well, my wife was working very hard, and she also attended to the church. So she would come see me about once a week. And the rest of the time you were pretty much alone? The local independent paper, IndieWeek, reported that ICE officials knew where Jose was, and that an ICE spokesperson had written in an email that they had not, quote, taken action to arrest Mr. Chicas at the church in accordance with its sensitive locations policy, but also that, quote, a final order of removal issued by a federal judge does not expire.

That judicial order would remain in effect at whatever point any person exits a sensitive location. So Jose stayed put. At home in Raleigh, Sandra was looking for a part-time job on top of her full-time job. Two of their children, Ezekiel and his older sister, still lived at home. With Jose no longer working, Sandra was having to support everyone. You couldn't make any money when you were here in Sanctuary, so all of the financial burden lay on your wife. You could no longer financially provide for your family. That must have been incredibly difficult for you to think about.

It was very hard. It was an incredibly difficult responsibility and burden for my wife. Yeah, the thing is, like he says, our lawyer says it's only for three months. I mean, she not promise. She just have a guess. And that's what I decide, okay. But the only thing relief is

because I come visiting him and my children visiting him. The three months came and went. Jose and Sandra checked in with their lawyers. They still didn't think it was safe for Jose to come home. Not yet. One of the hardest parts of it all for both Jose and Sandra was having to explain what was going on to their children.

They impact. They impact my, all of our children's life. But more really is my daughter, our daughter, and my youngest one, Ezekiel, is very close to his father, very close. They really impact. Because he used to ask me questions. He used to cry, angry, you know, stuff like that.

And he, why this? Why? Why? Why they accuse my father? Why this? Too much, too much question. And he told me, I wish I can come with my father. That touched me and that's making me like, I said, baby, I do my best what I can, but it's not easy. Ezekiel had just started sixth grade at a year-round school, so every few months he'd get three weeks of vacation. Every of those three weeks, I came here to stay three weeks straight. But just even staying here for like a month, and just having to go back, it just wasn't the same. Because, like, he's just not home.

So, like, you expect to go home and have two parents and not have two homes and one parent each one. But, you know, I tried my best that I could to provide support to him and be here. So you lived here, too, in this sanctuary? Every break I had, every chance I had to come here, I would just come. Jose says he would wake up early every day and sit on the front porch for a while. Then he'd go inside to pray and read his Bible. He had a lot of time to think. And one thing he thought a lot about was the pain he was feeling in some of his teeth.

He knew he needed to see a dentist, but that would mean leaving the safety of the house. So he just hoped the pain would go away on its own. Months went by like this. Were there ever any nights here when you were by yourself, when your teeth were hurting and you were thinking, is it worth it to go and get it fixed? When you thought, this doesn't make any sense. This isn't worth it. I might as well just go back to El Salvador because this is too hard.

Well, we would talk and I would tell my wife, I'm just tired, I need to go. And she would say, well, maybe there will be some changes in the administration. Or my attorney would tell me, just be patient, something will happen. But of course, it crossed my mind several times to just leave. Jose says sometimes he thought about just showing up at the ICE facility in Charlotte and turning himself in, and then calling Sandra from El Salvador to tell her she didn't have to worry anymore. Eventually, Jose admitted to himself that he had to go to the dentist. It was an emergency. He told Sandra what he wanted to do. Do you remember talking to him about that and being really nervous about making that decision, talking about that decision?

Yes, I support him and I say, I call him mi amor. You know, my, como se dice? My love. My love, I say, if something happens, go happen. But I support you because I feel good. I'm worried for you. You need attention. Let's go.

And he say, are you okay? I say, yes, I'm okay about that. Because he need attention. And I support him. Jose's son Oscar picked him up. Jose says not only was he nervous that he'd get caught, but he also felt emotional, seeing so many other people around him in cars and at the dentist office who had no idea what he was going through.

When it was over and he was safely back at the church, he says he cried. Jose had been in sanctuary for about a year and a half. He says he'd given up. It didn't seem possible for him to leave. He says he wrote on a whiteboard in the parish building, making a countdown of the number of days until the 2020 presidential election,

which he thought might bring a policy change. It's funny, I think a lot of people were watching the election, wondering what was going to happen. You actually, your life, in some ways depended on who was going to win this election. Yes, if the Republicans had won, if Trump had been re-elected, it would have been a complete nightmare for us, for my family.

I had already told my wife, if Trump is re-elected, I will go back to El Salvador. You couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't do it anymore. There would have been really no more possibilities for me. Jose watched the election results on television with his son Ezekiel. And when Biden won,

neighbors and church friends came to celebrate. It was incredible that they, many people came, they would drive by and honk the horns. And so many people in the community helped me

and they knew what was at stake. And many of them knocked on the door and just yelled and screamed, Biden won! We were just so happy. On the day he was inaugurated, January 20, 2021, President Biden signed a 100-day moratorium on deportations. And shortly after that, Jose's lawyer told him it was finally safe for him to leave the parish building.

He'd been living there for three and a half years. Three years and seven months. Here's Jose's son, Ezequiel. And like that same day, we just immediately just start packing everything ready to go. It was a moment of relief right there. Finally, after all the hard work that I, my parents, our friends have done, it finally came to an end. So, yeah, it was a big relief that it happened.

Was your dad ready to get out of here? Was he packing things right away, ready to go? Yes, he very was. Sadly, we couldn't move everything out that same day. We had to wait for my brother to come with his truck to get everything out. But, like, he was just ready to go. He wanted to drive off of here without anyone knowing, but we just had to wait patiently another

couple days, and then we finally got home. On January 22nd, Sandra drove to Durham to pick up Jose. Neighbors stood in the street cheering. Someone had a cowbell. To celebrate, Jose wanted to go eat Chinese food. It was incredible. We were just so glad. But, you know, during the first month that I was out of sanctuary, I would go with my wife to the store or to restaurants, and I would see people looking at me because I'd been on TV a few times, and people would recognize me, or they would point and say, he's the guy that was in Sanctuary.

I really felt like I had lived through a trauma. What's it like to have him home, to have everything? It's not normal, right, because you've lost so much time, but back, to have him back. It's a good feeling, knowing that the house is finally complete. And, you know, it's not normal because he was away for a while, but now hopefully we can reprogress and catch up on everything. And everything seems to just fall in place right now as it's going.

That's what I believe is a miracle how that happened because nothing planned and it just happened. I'm glad for this door come open. Sandra says they recently went to the beach to celebrate their 29th anniversary. The trip was a surprise gift from their kids and members of their church, who secretly made the hotel reservation and got a gift certificate to a seafood restaurant. When they called Sandra and Jose, they said, We have a surprise for you.

According to Church World Service, which tracked the publicly known cases, Jose Chicas was one of 71 undocumented immigrants who found sanctuary on church grounds after President Trump's election. Most, like Jose, have been able to return home since President Biden took office. Although President Biden issued a 100-day pause on deportation orders in January, a federal judge in Texas blocked the order only six days later. It's not clear what will happen next. We contacted ICE for this story, but they did not respond to our request for an interview or comment on Jose Chicas' case. Sandra told us she tries to tell Jose not to worry too much, to try to enjoy himself day by day.

They have another trip to the beach planned for this summer. Thank you. Michael Raphael and Rob Byers of Final Final V2. Julian Alexander creates original illustrations for each episode and some merch. We have bags and shirts and even a water bottle. You can see it all at thisiscriminal.com. Follow us online and let us know what you think about the story or if you have another story you'd like to hear us cover. We're on Twitter at Criminal Show, Instagram at Criminal underscore Podcast,

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