Salesh Prasad was set to return back home after serving nearly three decades in prison. He had been granted release by a parole board, which recognized his rehabilitative work during his incarceration, including leading support groups. Prasad had been given a second chance. “I had worked so hard, and I was so proud to tell my mom that I was finally coming home,” he told The Guardian.
But he never got to go home. Like Sandra Castaneda and Gabby Solano, the Fijian immigrant was instead turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). He has been detained by federal immigration officials for nearly a year now, and risks deportation to a country he hasn’t lived in for decades. Prasad left Fiji with his family when he was 6 years old. He’s now 50.
RELATED STORY: California bill aims to stop unjust double punishment of immigrants who have served their time
“If I’m deported, I won’t survive. I won’t make it in Fiji,” Prasad told The Guardian. An openly queer man, he worries about “police violence and attacks on LGBTQ+ people” if he is deported, the report said. “There’s no protection there for me. There’s no support,” he continued, noting he has no close family there. “I’d be forced to be somebody I’m not. I don’t want to hide again. I should be able to love who I want to love.”
“Prasad faces further risks due to his gang tattoos from his youth, which could make him a target of police, his lawyer says, and because he is Indo-Fijian, an ethnic minority that has historically faced discrimination,” the report continued. “US government lawyers have rejected those pleas, which means he has few recourses beyond continued appeals.”
In the meantime, he remains detained at Golden State Annex, which Daily Kos has previously noted has been at the center of civil rights complaints over the mistreatment of detained people. “People in ICE custody have been holding hunger strikes, prayer vigils and other peaceful protests to draw public attention to the dangerous conditions and failure of officials to take the necessary precautions to help prevent the spread of COVID-19,” the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California said last year.
“But rather than take meaningful measures to address these legitimate health and safety concerns, those who operate the detention centers have engaged in a range of punitive measures against protesters,” a release continued.
Lawmakers and advocates recently rallied at the state capitol in support of the VISION Act, which would ensure that immigrants who have served their time or have been ordered for release shouldn’t be punished twice. “I am tired of having to support a justice system in the state of California that treats citizens one way and immigrants in a different way,” Wendy Carrillo, California assembly member and bill author, recently told Davis Vanguard. “Either we believe in a justice system that treats everyone equally, or we continue to support a justice system that treats people [as] unequal.”
Supporting the bill that day was Gabby Solano, who had to phone in her support, Davis Vanguard said. The domestic violence survivor had her sentence commuted by former Gov. Jerry Brown, had support from the state’s parole board, and completed 1,000 hours of rehabilitation courses, but she was instead turned over to ICE and deported to Mexico a year ago.
The ICE Out of California Coalition in the tweet above details the rigorous process that incarcerated must go through in order to win release. But on the day he was supposed to be released and reunite with his mom, the prison handed him over to ICE. “He has paid his dues. When is it enough?” Amitesh Diyal, Prasad’s nephew, told The Guardian. “I just want my uncle to be able to spend time with my kids.”
Click here to donate and help protect immigrant youth from deportation.
RELATED STORIES:
Green card holder is facing deportation even after a court overturned her conviction
ICE may have deported up to 70 U.S. citizens in recent years—and there could be even more
Border official lies to Congress, saying detained U.S. citizen never claimed to be one (he did)