Plainville man deported
Longtime operator of El Paso sent back to his native Mexico
Isaias Iriarte, the longtime operator of the El Paso restaurant in Plainville, has been deported to Mexico, according to his family and his attorney. His relatives and friends held a rally last week on his behalf, hoping to win a court hearing for him, but immigration officials sent him back to Mexico.
PLAINVILLE — Isaias Iriarte, the longtime operator of the El Paso restaurant in the center of Plainville, was deported to Mexico on Wednesday, according to his family and his immigration attorney.
His relatives and friends held a rally last week on his behalf, hoping to win a court hearing for him. But Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents sent him back to Mexico a little under three weeks after taking him into custody.
“Isaias was deported with little notice,” said Carolina Bortolleto, a member of CT Immigrants Rights Alliance.
Relatives spoke with him early on the morning of Dec. 26, when he was at a detention center in New Hampshire, and later were told by ICE that he was being moved.
“The next time the family heard about Isaias was from Isaias himself. He called his family upon landing in Mexico,” Bortolleto said Thursday afternoon.
Aspokesman for ICE’s regional office in Boston could not be reached for comment. The deportation means Iriarte cannot apply for readmission to the U.S. for 10 years, said Anthony Collins, his immigra-
tion attorney.
“He had been here for 27 years; all we were asking for was a chance to go before a judge,” Collins said Thursday.
ICE agents stopped Iriarte and his wife on Dec. 7 as they were doing errands for their business, according to local immigration activists. ICE did not need to go through a hearing before deporting Iriarte because he had been deported before.
Iriarte, who was born in Oaxaca, Mexico, came to the country in 1991 and lived here for more than 10 years before going back to Mexico to see his dying mother, according to Collins. He was stopped at the border when he tried to return to the U.S. and was sent back to Mexico.
Iriarte returned again to the United States, and has lived here since. In 2002, he opened the El Paso on East Main Street as a small grocery store specializing in Latin American specialty foods. The family gradually made the El Paso into a restaurant.
Relatives and friends described him as a hardworking man who built a local business. State Rep. William Petit, R-Plainville, who attended the rally on Iriarte’s behalf last Friday, said that the United States must remain a nation of laws, but that it needs a coherent immigration policy offering a realistic path to citizenship for people like Iriarte.
Collins had warned that ICE could deport Iriarte at any time, and was petitioning the agency to waive its standing deportation order and let him present his case to a judge. But ICE didn’t relent.
“I am not sure what our future will be like without him,” said Jalinne Iriarte, 20, his oldest daughter and a Central Connecticut State University student. “Without my father working to support our family, I am not sure if I will continue attending college or if I have to stop to help my mother at the restaurant.”
Iriarte’s youngest daughter, Bitsy, 17, said the family appreciates everyone who attended the rally and signed a petition asking ICE for leniency.
“Having my father taken out of my life is the worst feeling i have ever felt. He will not see my walk down the stage on my graduation this spring. He will not be here for my18th birthday,” said Bitsy Iriarte, a 17-year- old Plainville High School senior.