“Julie X Begins a New Life in the United States After Decades as an Undocumented Immigrant”
By: Armando Vazquez
Executive Director Acuna Cultural Center at Café on A
(Other Voices is an opinion column that provides a criminal justice forum where different viewpoints can be expressed by people from all political, socio-economic, ethnic and cultural backgrounds.)
This is how Julie X begins her painful confessional narrative, “This is my true and accurate testimony. I was born in in August 20, 1979 in Michoacán, Morelia, Mexico to a single abusive alcoholic mother. I do not know who my real father is; his identity was never reveal to me! My mother abandoned me, along with an older brother when I was a baby, I do not recall how old I was.
At about 3 years of age my three adult uncles began to molest and rape me. This rape and torture continued for years. I was a baby, a defenseless child and had no one that would protect me. I think my grandmother knew what was going on but what could she do? My grandmother is dead now taking all account of her involvement with her to her grave.
At the age of 7 my mother came to my grandmother’s house where I lived with her and many other cousins. One day she decided to smuggle me and my older brother into California. My mother was not alone in the smuggling operation she had help from a man that she identified as her husband.
They smuggled us successfully into Oxnard. I have lived in Oxnard since I was 7 years of age. I attended Ramona Elementary, Frank and Fremont Jr. High and dropped out of Oxnard High School in the 10th grade.
Almost immediately after I was smuggled into Oxnard, California, “my step father” began to force alcohol down my throat, rape and torture me.
This continued for many years until he died.
I believe that my mother knew what was going on but when I confronted her she denied involvement or complicity in the rape and torture. She call me a whore and that if anyone was at fault it was me for being a cheap slut that teased her husband into his sexual acts.
Before “my step father” died, he and my mother tried to get me naturalized and we took a trip to Juarez, Mexico. For whatever reason my naturalization protocol ad application was never completed or processed”
This is how Julie X became a ghost, a slave, chattel, a sound bit, and a statistic to be used and manipulated by politicians, functionaries; as so many others millions of undocumented souls she was sucked into the black hole that characterizes our broken immigration system in the United States.
But if nothing else Julie X is a fighter, the most courageous and most resilient human being I have ever known; she fought and prayed for a miracle!
Today, June 12, 2016 Julie can take a deep breath and smile here prayers have been answered.
After more than 30 years of living as a “undocumented” ghost without identity, Julie was provide the very vital and necessary certification of cooperation with local law enforcement documentation by Mr Michael Schwartz, Senior Assistant District Attorney with the Ventura County’s District Attorney office.
The certification of cooperation is the requisite legal document demanded by Homeland Security and the Department of Immigration Services when “undocumented” victims of certain crimes (in the case of Julie X it was rape) file for U-Visa consideration; a formal and legal process that if successful can grant the petitioner legal resident status in the United States.
Julie X’s certification of cooperation document could not have been obtained without the tireless work of key community players in this human drama.
Dr Debbie De Vries and I met Julie X some 17 years ago in our work with acute at–risk youth and their families that we conducted through our with the KEYS Leadership Academy.
We learned very early on in our relationship that Julie was undocumented and so began our 17 year struggle to get Julie her naturalization documentation. Since that time Julie X has become a single mother of two boys. Julies has be fighting acute alcoholism for most of her adolescent and adult life.
Julie X got into trouble with the police on a number of occasions, all on drunk in public charges. She lost her kids to the system for a few years. Julie X had hit rock bottom; but she did not give up and she continued to fight her acute alcoholism and for reunification with her kids.
Ventura County Children Protective Services help Julie gain her sobriety, reunite with her children and in the process help her seek for the first time psychiatric help and she was diagnosis with acute PTSD and acute chemical addiction (alcoholism). Slowly Julie X. began arduous road to recover her humanity.
In 2006, Julie filled an Oxnard Police Department report that she had been raped. The OPD investigated her allegation and arrested a suspect. The rapist was tried and convicted in Ventura County on rape charges later that year.
Grotesquely it was this rape that open the door for the U-Visa naturalization protocol to kick in.
We had obtained the pro bono legal assistance of various attorney and requested all of the police reports from the OPD regarding the 2006 Rape crime committed against Julie. Initially the OPD denied providing Julie these vital police reports.
This is when our local League of United Latin American Citizens’ office became involved as civil rights advocates for Julie. It was through the influence and political connection that LULAC has in Ventura County that things begin to happen and happen quickly in Julie’s favor.
LULAC officials, working closely with the Oxnard Police Department and various departments in the Ventura County government, and in particular with Human Social Services and the District Attorney’s office, obtained the necessary legal and medical documentation and after an additional through review of Julie X’s medical files.
He is where Mr Michael Schwartz did something extraordinarily noble and just; he conducted a further review of Julie X’s full and complete medical file. The compelling medical evidence was sufficient to alter his earlier denial and Julie X was finally granted the U-Visa certification of cooperation.
Julie X and the Acuna Gallery at the Café on A family would personally like to thank all of the many players involved in this successful community immigration action; in particular LULAC officials, the various departments of Ventura County government involved in this case, the Oxnard Police Department and the District Attorney office.
It took Julie X more than 30 years to come out of the shadows, but she will the first to tell you it was worth the fight, she is now truly free to pursue her American Dreams!
For more information on Cafe on A:
Executive Directors Dr. Deborah DeVries and Armando Vazquez
438 South “A” Street, Oxnard , CA 93030 Box 1387, Oxnard 93032-1387
Phone: 805-216-4560