Friends, attorney fighting for return of Southport man deported to Mexico

WILMINGTON, NC (WECT) - A man living in Southport who illegally immigrated to the U.S. at age 14 was deported to Mexico, but his attorney and close friends are fighting for his return after they say he wasn't given a fair chance in the justice system.

Christian Ayala-Lopez, 31, lived in Southport for most of his adult life. He was deported by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on Monday and sent on a plane to Mexico.

At the time of his detainment and deportation, Ayala-Lopez was living with the Fullwood family in Southport. He was a caretaker for Leon Fullwood, a Vietnam veteran living with dementia.

"In his 80s, my father deserves to have his best friend and companion there to take care of him," said Melina Fullwood, Leon Fullwood's daughter and a close friend of Ayana-Lopez since 2006. "But ICE lied to me, lied to Christian, and violated the law when they transferred him out of the U.S. without giving him his day in court."

Ayala-Lopez was born in Mexico in November 1986 and immigrated illegally to the U.S. in February 2001.

He remained in the U.S. without leaving until Monday when ICE deported him.

While in the U.S., Ayala-Lopez was arrested twice for DWI with one charge resulting in a conviction and the other being dismissed.

Helen Tarokic, an immigration and naturalization law attorney based in Wilmington, is representing Ayala-Lopez.

"I've spent a lot of time screaming into the wind and suing people," Tarokic said. "I think that's probably my best summary of what we've been doing, and I will continue to do that until we get justice."

Ayala-Lopez's 2013 DWI arrest, which was dismissed, resulted in him ending up in the hands of ICE, but he was released from immigration detention and ICE lawyers shut down the case.

Ayala-Lopez and Tarokic began working to get him legal status as a Dreamer under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.

But Ayala-Lopez was arrested again in 2014 for DWI, and that charge ended in a conviction. This also triggered an ICE attorney to re-calendar him for deportation.

Ayala-Lopez's interactions with ICE came to a head after he got a call about a missed probation appointment.

"ICE had the Brunswick (County) probation department lie to him, and pretend that there was an appointment that Christian had missed," said Tarokic.

When Ayala-Lopez showed up at the probation department, ICE agents were waiting to detain him for deportation.

Before his deportation, Tarokic says Ayala-Lopez was transferred between multiple detention facilities without proper legal notification.

Bryan Cox, a spokesperson with ICE, emailed the following statement after a request from WECT:

"U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested unlawfully present Mexican national Christian Ayala-Lopez June 20 during a targeted enforcement action in Brunswick County, North Carolina. Mr. Ayala-Lopez is subject to a final order of removal issued in June 2016 and the courts subsequently denied his appeal of that order in March 2017. He also has criminal convictions for DUI. Mr. Ayala-Lopez was removed from the U.S. to Mexico Monday in accordance with his removal order."

Tarokic's legal argument on behalf of Ayala-Lopez uses a recent Supreme Court ruling — Pereira v. Sessions — in combination with her assertion that ICE violated several procedural rules in its treatment of Ayala-Lopez.

Pereira v. Sessions ruled that if a non-citizen is served with a document requiring a notice to appear without the time or place to appear, the court cannot reasonably expect that person to appear.

"The Department of Homeland Security has admitted 99 percent of their deportation proceedings have been initiated with the wrong paperwork," said Tarokic about Pereira v. Sessions, "and it's so faulty that the Supreme Court said that it's essentially unfixable without terminating deportations and restarting the process."

Tarokic said ICE failed to follow proper procedures, including failure to notify her as the attorney when Ayala-Lopez was rescheduled for deportation proceedings, transferred between detention centers.

Tarokic also claims ICE retaliated against her client by expediting his removal after they began taking legal action against the agency.

Cox writes, "Any claims Mr. Ayala was denied all appropriate process before the courts are false.

"The bottom line is this is a person who violated federal immigration law, had their day in court and was ordered deported by the federal immigration courts. He then appealed and the courts denied his appeal," Cox continued. "Beyond that, he is a convicted criminal, and he was removed from the U.S. in full accordance with federal law and agency policy."

Ayala-Lopez is in Mexico while his attorney and friends work for his legal return to the U.S.

"I still need to have my day in court with Christian, but there are hundreds if not thousands of lawyers across the country that are filing similar motions for their clients," said Tarokic. "When he came here when he was 14 years old, he didn't have the legal capacity to commit crimes, to really understand the impact of crossing the border without inspection, or any of that."

Copyright 2018 WECT. All rights reserved.