Mirna Gutierrez stands anxiously outside the door of the Rockingham County jail on a late September afternoon. It’s windy, and she’s wearing a black hoodie with the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe printed on the back. It belonged to her husband, Oscar Gutierrez. She says it still smells like him.
Mirna and a few friends went to the jail to bail Oscar out after a DWI arraignment. Even though Mirna is a citizen and Oscar has lived in Manchester for nearly two decades, Oscar is originally from Honduras and has a complicated immigration history. The jail had to notify ICE they’re letting Oscar go, and it was unclear to Mirna whether the bail commissioner or ICE was going to arrive first.
“They say they’re looking for criminals,” she said in Spanish. “But the only one who has changed my life and well-being is my husband. He’s the reason I’m alive. If it weren’t for him, I would be dead.”
Like Oscar and Mirna, thousands of families have been caught in a very specific wrinkle of U.S. law over the past year: the complex interaction between criminal and civil immigration courts.
Although nearly 80% of New Hampshire immigration detainees last year did not commit any crime, ICE’s increasingly aggressive tactics mean that any interaction with the criminal justice system could lead to ICE detention for some immigrants.
Buzz Scherr, who chairs the International Criminal Law and Justice Program at the University of New Hampshire, said that even though New Hampshire has a particularly strong DWI law, the crime itself doesn’t matter to ICE.
“It's nothing specific to a DWI,” he said. “It could be a simple assault. It could be a disorderly conduct. It could be a criminal trespass. It could be anything, any crime at all. They're going to run the name through the computer and see if there's an ICE detainer.”
Using criminal databases for immigration enforcement is not a new tactic, but it has become increasingly common in New Hampshire over the past year.
Federal agents tackled Nashua resident and Venezuelan citizen Arnuel Márquez in the lobby outside of his DWI arraignment in Nashua in February. Manchester resident Jose Davila was arrested outside a courthouse after his DWI hearing in July. The Troy police arrested two people in Keene outside the Cheshire County Courthouse in November.
Beyond the potential immigration consequences of having a criminal record, Scherr said being in ICE detention means detainees often miss their court dates and never resolve the original charge.
“If ICE has detained you, you go into the system. You ain't showing up for your DWI case,” he said. “You don't get to say, ‘hey, wait, I got to deal with my DWI before you deport me.’ "
That was Mirna’s fear: that the DWI charge would alert ICE about Oscar. She said he left Honduras when he was 18 because he didn’t want to pay extortion to a local gang. Oscar came to the U.S., was deported in 2005 and then re-entered the country without authorization. He missed a court date and had an open deportation order. But he’s still under threat back home and she was worried that deportation might be a death sentence.
“I can’t go to Honduras. I can’t risk having him killed, or getting my kids, or me, killed,” she said. “My worry is that he will get deported and killed, and the government isn’t going to come and help me then.”
But Oscar’s immigration status didn’t matter to Mirna when they met. Mirna left Guatemala in 2008, moved to Manchester and became a parishioner at St. Anne-St. Augustin in the city. In 2011, some nuns invited her to a Bible study, which Oscar was leading. Two weeks later, they moved in together.
Mirna’s life changed. She has epilepsy, which makes it hard for her to balance work and her medical appointments. Oscar became their main breadwinner, which meant Mirna could focus on her treatment for the first time.
“For me, it was a blessing from God because we didn’t spend years getting to know each other. He was like an angel from heaven that God put in my way,” she said.
They were married a day before Easter and had a baby named Filippe. And then, doctors found a brain tumor the size of a grape in Mirna’s head. They operated immediately. Mirna remembers how Oscar worked hard to provide for his family.
“He would get home from work at 7 p.m. to wash me, give me medicine, give the baby a bath. He would stay up all night with me,” she remembered. “And at 4 a.m., that man was already awake, waiting for the person he hired to care for me and my son.”
Despite complications after the surgery, her health improved. Mirna became pregnant again and Filippe grew up. He’s 13 and in middle school now. Like most kids, he likes Roblox and soccer, and teases his little brother, who is 9.
He especially remembers a day when his dad took him to Hampton Beach to learn how to fish when he was five, during the first Trump administration. Turns out, Oscar didn’t have a fishing license. A local official stopped him and called ICE, who detained him at Hampton Beach.
The officers told Filippe they were taking his dad home for them, to save on gas.
“I was watching two officers putting chains all over his body, his feet, his hands — everything,” he said in Spanish. “And I said, ‘but why, if they’re bringing him home?’ And then, I said, ‘well, it’s probably so that he doesn’t fall out.’ ”
Filippe stayed up late, but Oscar didn’t come home that night. Oscar was still detained when Filippe’s little brother, Oscar Jr., was born. Filippe called his dad on the phone often. His dad told him he was at the beach, on vacation. Filippe was jealous. He wished he was on a beach vacation, too.
And then, Mirna said there was a miracle: a discretionary stay of deportation. Oscar was released because of his standing in the community and lack of a criminal record. Filippe says he was the first to jump out of the car. He grabbed his dad’s hand and wouldn’t let go.
Oscar still had to check in with ICE periodically to renew the discretionary stay. He applied for asylum, was denied, and appealed the case. Oscar still had a work permit and continued to work in construction, drive Mirna to her medical appointments, stay involved with his church, and help lead an AA group in the church basement.
“In the past 14 years, all he’s done is work, treat me well, take me to my doctors appointments, take care of my medical treatments, feed my kids, give them a good education, and take them to church every Sunday," Mirna said.
Last February, Oscar and Mirna drove to a job site in Deerfield. They got into an accident and the police showed up, but there was an open container. Mirna said there were old beer cans in the back of the truck. The police let him go, and his court date was set for the fall. The judge set bail and the commissioner showed up before ICE.
Oscar went back to work, but with a suspended license. Two weeks later, Mirna drove Oscar to work at 6 a.m. As they passed Central High School in Manchester, four men in vests and plain clothes stopped them.
Mirna recorded a video that shows apparent ICE officers say they have a warrant and take Oscar. He kissed her and walked quietly to a black SUV. The officer asked Mirna’s status also, but let her go since she is a citizen.
Since October. Mirna and the kids have relied on community support and Mirna’s disability. They filed a habeas corpus petition, which was denied. Mirna has missed lots of medical appointments and is anxious about her future.
“They don’t know the damage that they’ve caused me, that they cause me day by day,” she said. “I wake up and am scared of being evicted for not paying the rent, to be out on the street with my kids. I don’t have the support of Social Security because I don’t have a tutor. I don’t have someone to be with me to take care of me, to back me up — it’s all him.”
Filippe is anxious, but he’s helping out and picking up his little brother from school. He misses his dad, although they talk often on the phone. He said he’s using the lessons Oscar taught him when he was younger, but wishes he could learn even more from his dad.
“He taught me how to work, how to follow good paths, how to find good friends, how to stay away from bad people who make bad life choices,” he said. “He taught me everything. I still have a lot to learn.”
A judge denied Oscar’s asylum appeal last week. He was deported back to Honduras on Friday.
