On Thursday my day supervisor, call her Jasmin, came to tell me that one of our housekeeping staff, let's call her Maria, was not doing well and would need to take some time off. I asked her why and when she told me I was horrified. About three months ago Maria's 19 year old nephew in Mexico was kidnapped and held for ransom.
Maria's nephew had apparently been set up by a so called "friend" and the kidnappers were demanding $10,000 American for his release. This may not seem like much compared to the high profile kidnapping stories we hear about where the kidnappers demand six and seven figure ransoms. But apparently kidnapping for ransom in Mexico is something of a career for common criminals and even police officers, and the victims are not limited to the wealthy or even middle class.
Maria and her family are not even middle class. She has an adult special needs son, a sixth grade education and as a janitor for our service industry company only makes $12.50/hr., better than she would make with our competition but still not very much. Other than her immediate family she is the only one living in the United States. All her other relatives live in or around Mexico City.
The family had managed to scrape together half of the money and left it at a designated drop point, hoping it would be enough. It wasn't. They heard nothing more from the kidnappers and after weeks of searching the boy's older brother found his body in the morgue where it had been for some time.
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I was surprised to see Maria in my office the next morning. She was visibly distraught. Her eyes were bloodshot and swollen, and she was uncharacteristically wearing yesterday's unwashed uniform. She told me she needed to leave. It was hard for me to find words to say to her but it was certainly far more difficult for her to come in to work that morning. I let her know I had heard about what happened to her nephew and that she could take as much time as she needed. Her eyes welled up as she told me he was only 19. Choking up myself I asked her if the police could help find the killers.
"No, the police don't help," she said, "it's Mexico . . . it's really bad."
In Mexico, with its history of drug-war violence and corrupt police, kidnapping is an old story. In the past, the crime tended to target the rich. Now it has become more egalitarian. Victims these days are often shopkeepers, taxi drivers, service employees, parking attendants and taco vendors who often work in cash or in Mexico’s “informal” economy. Targets also tend to be young — students, with parents willing to pay ransoms, are commonly targeted. http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
Depending on the source it is estimated that 90-99% of Mexican kidnappings go unreported.
Last year, Mexico officially recorded 1,698 kidnappings, the highest number on record. Yet government officials concede that only a small percentage of victims — one in 10 by some estimates — report the crime, as police are sometimes involved in kidnappings and not trusted. The statistics kept by Miranda’s organization, Association to Stop Kidnapping (Asociacion Alto al Secuestro) , recorded 3,038 kidnappings last year. Another, led by Fernando Ruiz Canales, a former kidnapping victim who now helps negotiate for the release of hostages, puts last year’s kidnapping total at 27,740, or 76 per day.
She told me she would be leaving the following morning, but that she was worried about how she would get back. A round trip ticket was about $450.00 and her daughter had only been able to pay for a one-way ticket. At this point I was pretty emotional and I told her not to worry about the ticket. We would find a way to take care of it and she just needed to tell us when she planned to return. She said she would come back as soon as possible because she had used her two weeks of paid time off visiting her family, including her nephew, last summer and couldn't afford to miss any more work.
We went to see our H.R. Director so I could fill her in on Maria's situation. Our H.R. assistant who speaks fluent Spanish and was able to translate. Maria's English is broken at best and my Spanish is even worse. I wanted to make it clear that we would take care of her return flight and to explain the bereavement options available to her. Maria was sobbing and I struggled to keep my composure.
I gave Maria a deep, prolonged hug and walked next door to our CEO's office to ask him for help with her flight. He asked me to send Maria in and although I don't know the content of their conversation I am confident he offered to help her. He is quite conservative but has a good heart and I've known him to do the right thing many times in the past for employees in need. As Maria was leaving, my assistant and I gave her what little cash we had.
It is Sunday now and I can't help thinking of all those who complain about the immigrants from Mexico and Central America. The ones who say they come for all the free stuff and take jobs away from Americans. They mostly rail against undocumented immigrants, but they also paint the documented with the same racist brush. I saw Maria a couple of times every day and during the whole time of her nephew's abduction she never said a word to me about it. She came in to my office each morning with a positive attitude and often asked how my kids were doing. When I asked about her family she would say they were fine.
Of the 28 people I have working in my department, 22 of them have Spanish surnames, and about 15 of them were not born in this country. They are mostly janitors, laundry and locker room attendants, gardeners and maintenance engineers. They are here to work. I rarely get people born in this country applying for these jobs, with the exception of maintenance. With our starting pay at $9.50, and even with benefits, most Americans don't want these jobs, or it they do they don't apply.
It is my experience that Hispanic immigrants are not here for anything else but a better life. They want to work, and they work hard. They don't expect free stuff. That's not why they are here. How can we as a society be so mean spirited as to block a bus load of women and children, and shout obscenities at them when they have risked everything to travel hundreds of miles to escape kidnap, rape and murder, from access to a place to sleep and food to eat while they wait for their day in court? How can we consider sending them back to a place where they are in fear for their life every day? What kind of country starts a war half way around the world, on false pretenses, squandering trillions of dollars and resulting in the maiming and death of thousands, but turns away our neighbors in need? What if they were us? Wouldn't we do anything to protect the lives of our children and try to provide for them the hope of a better life?
I guess I've wandered off topic. I hope Maria has made it home safely.