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Being in jail in Pecos was hard on Manriquez, Pulcher told Human Rights Watch. She
was taken to the emergency room at one point when she experienced shortness of
breath, and was diagnosed with high blood pressure and anxiety disorder. But the
federal detention facility in Houston was even worse. “She said it was very rough,”
Pulcher said. “Never, never in her life had she been in one of these places, the Christian
lady in federal prison.... Every time I went to see her, all of us would cry. She would start
crying so bad, she’d start shaking.”
Manriquez now lives in Juarez alone. All the lawyers her family has consulted have said
the same thing: because she pled guilty the first time, all doors were closed and she
would never be able to come back to the United States.
When her mother was deported,
Pulcher felt like “she had died,”
and she began to be treated for
depression. She continues to
worry about her mother’s safety
in Juarez and has considered
moving to Mexico to be with her
mother, but she cannot make
that decision for her husband
and her son.
Rosa Emma Manriquez at a family dinner with her US citizen
daughter, Norma Pulcher. © Private
Pulcher lost her stepson last year; he died while serving in the US military in
Afghanistan. Before he died, he had tried to help the woman he considered “granny” by
contacting his congressional representative. Pulcher is angry that the US government
has taken her mother away from her as well: “It doesn’t matter how much pain and
suffering children and grandchildren are going through, it didn’t touch [the US officials’]
hearts. They didn’t take a minute to look at her situation ... [to ask] why are we
separating her from her family?” 127
127 Human Rights Watch telephone interview with Norma Pulcher, October 24, 2012. A call to the prosecutor for comment on
this case was not returned.
49 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH | MAY 2013