Kin want tumor patient in Qns.
SHE’S FREE, for now.
The Salvadoran asylum seeker who collapsed at an immigration detention center and learned she has a large tumor near her brain won her release Thursday at an emergency bond hearing.
Sara Beltran Hernandez, 27, walked out of the Texas lockup hours later, cried tears of joy and called her mom in New York, said the lawyer who successfully argued she wasn’t a flight risk.
“I can’t wait to see her. I haven’t seen her for 16 years. I want to welcome her with happiness,” mom Esmeralda Hernandez, 42, told the Daily News.
Family sources said a relative was en route to Dallas to check on Beltran Hernandez in person and bring her back to Jamaica, Queens, as soon as possible.
“We are trying to go down there and pick her up. If we can’t get her on a plane, we’ll bring her here on a bus,” Esmeralda Hernandez said.
“I’m worried about her. She has a brain tumor. She said, ‘Mom my head hurts,’ ” Hernandez said in an exclusive phone interview with The News. “I want her to start treatment once she gets here.”
The mom spoke after rushing to the Jacob Javits Federal Building in Manhattan on Thursday to post the $15,000 bond for her sick daughter’s release.
“I’ll be worried until I see her in person,” said the mom, whose younger daughter, Raquel Beltran Hernandez, 20, already lives in New York.
Sara Beltran Hernandez, a mother of two, was fleeing domestic and gang violence in El Salvador when she was arrested after crossing the border into Texas in November 2015 on her way to New York, her family said.
She spent more than a year in the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado petitioning for asylum before she collapsed Feb. 11 and was rushed to Texas Health Huguley Hospital in Fort Worth.
Doctors diagnosed her with a large tumor in her pituitary gland next to her brain, her lawyer confirmed. Despite her pain, dizziness and memory loss, she was yanked from her hospital bed on Feb. 22 and returned to Prairieland in a wheelchair, a move that worried her family, lawyer Fatma Marouf said.
“She was coming here looking for asylum and instead spent all that time in a detention center. I can’t imagine what she’s been through,” Esmeralda Hernandez told The News.
An immigration judge previously denied Beltran Hernandez’s asylum request and ordered her deported. The case is under appeal. In court papers filed Monday, Marouf said her client was treated like a dangerous criminal during her medical crisis.
She was placed on a “no contact” list at the hospital, had guards in her room at all times — even during discussions with doctors — and was escorted back to the detention center in handcuffs, the lawyer said.
An Immigration and Customs Enforcement official denied any mistreatment, saying she was not shackled and had adequate access to lawyer and family calls.
Beltran Hernandez was resting at a hotel Thursday afternoon, her lawyer said.
“As soon as she walked out of the detention center, she was admiring the blue sky and the green grass. She really felt the beautiful day and was so happy to be free,” Marouf said. “She was crying. It was relief and joy. And she was very grateful for all the help and public support.”
Beltran Hernandez visited a neurosurgeon Monday and learned the mass in her skull was benign but growing larger in a precarious place behind her eyes, Marouf said.
Amnesty International backed Beltran Hernandez’s cause, calling for members to petition ICE officials for her freedom.