For the past few weeks, we’ve been highlighting stories from the We Are America site, and we are happy to report on a success story.

We shared the story of Yves Gomes, a DC-area teenager who was facing deportation. Two weeks ago, he was granted a reprieve.

From the Post:

Robin and Cecilia Gomes had tourist visas when they brought 14-month-old Yves to visit relatives in Silver Spring in 1994, according to lawyers, advocates and family members. The parents immediately set about establishing legal residency. During the process they obtained work permits and paid taxes. Robin was a hotel waiter; Cecilia became an assistant professor of computer science at Northern Virginia Community College. She gave birth to a second son, Aaron, now 15, an American citizen.

Robin Gomes’s appeal for political asylum was denied in 2006, and the family was ordered to leave the country. By that time, the family’s life was so rooted in the United States, it seemed impossible to go, Cecilia Gomes said. In 2008, the family was stopped by police for a faulty taillight. Days later, immigration agents surrounded its house off New Hampshire Avenue and detained Robin Gomes. It was the last time Yves and Aaron saw their father, who was deported to his native Bangladesh.

Cecilia Gomes had to wear an ankle bracelet as she was given time to sell the family’s house and organize their affairs before being deported last year to her native India. The boys moved in with their great uncle and aunt, Henry and Dominica Gomes, who are naturalized U.S. citizens.

Then it was Yves’s turn. The family’s immigration attorney, Cynthia Groomes Katz, who said she cut her fees in half because she believed in the case, won a delay in his deportation so he could finish high school.

Yves’ story is just one of the 1,100 that will be represented in Washington, DC on September 15th when community leaders from around the country gather to demand the relief, reform and respect the immigration reform movement deserves!

Categories: DREAM, enforcement, immigrant stories, Maryland, Relief Reform Respect