By JODI SOKOLOWSKI
Buffalo Law Journal

Thousands of foreign-born people legally come to the United States every year.

Some of those visitors overstay their limit and end up arrested and held in detention centers with little or no legal help. Often they're deported, separated from the lives they've created in the Land of Opportunity.

A new documentary film follows four such families, mostly Arabs and Muslims, whose lives were permanently altered by post-9/11 immigration policies.

The film, "Out of Status," is the creation of Pia Sawhney and Sanjna Singh of Chai Break Films. It will be screened Feb. 7 as a fundraiser for Hallwalls and the Bar Association of Erie County's Volunteer Lawyers Project Inc., funded by a donation from Hodgson Russ LLP.

VLP Supervising Immigration Attorney Sophie Feal says she wanted to show the film as a fundraiser after a colleague told her about a friend who was arrested by immigration officials and placed in removal proceedings.

"This friend, a U.S. citizen, couldn't believe that a hard-working, honest, decent person would be deported from the U.S. for doing nothing wrong," Feal says. "People say, ‘How could this happen? Isn't there anything I can do to help him?' "

Hard to stay

Most U.S. citizens, she said, "don't understand how difficult it is, if not impossible, to stay in the United States."

Noting the circumstances of one family in the film that is affected by a father's deportation, she said, "I don't know how you can say on one hand (that you) respect family values and that fathers are role models for children, then on the other hand point the father out the door. There are a lot of ripple effects, such as poverty, crime, children without male role models, when you separate families."

Feal, who regulary travels to the Batavia Detention Center to educate some 1,300 detainees a year about their legal rights, says she sees many different examples of illegals who are detained - such as an American man who married and had children with a Mexican woman, who now must return to Mexico for 10 years in order to obtain a permanent resident card, or "green card."

"Those who choose not to take a chance (by applying for citizenship) live underground with this fear of being deported," Feal says. "It happens all the time, especially with marriages."

Feal is also concerned about the extra scrutiny at the border since Sept. 11, 2001, faced by those of Arab descent. The embarrassment can be too much for highly educated students and professionals, many of whom decide not to return to the United States for fear of unfair selection, she says.

One local agency that serves this population is Vive La Casa, a West Side organization that annually houses and feeds 3,600 non-Americans, most seeking asylum in Canada.

"When people think of those coming here illegally, they think of Mexicans crossing illegally for restaurant or farm jobs. But there are many different stories of those out of status," says Vive Executive Director Brian Brown-Cashdollar, who notes that out-of-status illegals include those seeking refugee status here or asylum status elsewhere because they face religious, racial and cultural persecution in their home countries.

"They're not just immigrating here because they want to or are trying to find jobs," he said.

Americans' perception of immigrants is not "very positive," Brown-Cashdollar says, adding that people seem to be more accepting of Tibetans rather than Afghanis or Somalians.

Something to talk about

Feal says she hopes the film will raise awareness and encourage dialogue about immigration issues so Americans can make more informed decisions, particularly with a presidential election on the horizon.

"My hope is to bring the reality to an average American audience so they can see firsthand that ‘they' are not the ‘them' that some would have us believe, but ‘they' are also us," Feal says.

A moderated panel discussion will follow the screening. The panelists will include Chad native Laurent Kouladoumgar, an asylum seeker who has been detained for four years and who represented himself until he got pro bono help from Damon & Morey associate Jesse Baldwin, and Wally Ruehle of the Legal Aid Society of Rochester NY Inc.

Proceeds from the screening will fund VLP programs. Funded through the U.S. Justice Department, the VLP may not provide direct representation for clients. It relies on attorneys to serve pro bono, as well as volunteer experts for medical and cultural testimony and translators, especially in the Arabic, Urdu, Bangli, Mandarin and Sri Lankan languages.

"The fundraiser will go into a pocket of money to make it easier for me to help my work - things that private lawyers take for granted," Feal says.