Missing Dallas teen accidentally deported to Columbia
By Eric Pfeiffer
A Dallas teen missing for more than a year has been found living in Columbia.
Lorene Turner says her granddaughter Jakadrien Turner ran away from home in the fall of 2010 when she was just 14. Jakadrien made her way to Houston, where she was arrested by police.
That's when things took a turn toward the Kafka-esque. Jakadrien gave the police a false name and her new alias just happened to match up with the name of a 22-year-old Columbia citizen who had been in the United States illegally. And to compound Turner's plight further, the Columbian national had a warrant out for her arrest.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) then deported Jakadrien in April 2011.
"They didn't do their work," Lorene Turner said. "How do you deport a teenager and send her to Colombia without a passport, without anything?"
Turner said she'd been looking on her computer every night for clues to her granddaughter's location, and has been cooperating with Dallas police as she carries out her search. It turns out that after Jakadrien was deported, she was given a work card in Columbia and released onto the streets.
"She talked about how they had her working in this big house cleaning all day, and how tired she was," Turner said.
Jakadrien is now being held in a Columbia detention facility while awaiting more information on her case.
"ICE takes these allegations very seriously," said ICE Director of Public Affairs Brian Hale. " At the direction of [the Department of Homeland Security], ICE is fully and immediately investigating this matter in order to expeditiously determine the facts of this case.
Jakadrien Turner, Missing Dallas Teen, Was Mistakenly Deported To Colombia By Authorities
A Dallas teenager who has been missing for two years was mistakenly deported to Colombia by authorities after she was arrested for theft, according to a Dallas-area news outlet.
Jakadrien Turner, who is now 15, ran away from home after her parents' divorce and her grandfather's death, according to WFAA. Shortly after, she was arrested in Houston for theft, and gave the police a fake name. But that name belonged to a Colombian national who was in the United States illegally, which led federal authorities to deport Turner — an African-American who does not speak Spanish.
Her grandmother, Lorene Turner, told the television station that she had been frantically searching for Jakadrien online. "They didn't do their work," Lorene said. "How do you deport a teenager and send her to Colombia without a passport, without anything?"
Immigration officials told WFAA that they followed procedure, and that they attempted to verify her identity and found nothing amiss.
According to the Dallas Morning News, Jakadrien — who was released by the Colombian government and issued a work card there — is now pregnant. But since American officials reached out to the Colombian government for help, the country's government has placed Jakadrien in a detention facility and refuses to return her to the U.S.
The paper also summed up some of her recent posts on Facebook:
July 6, 8:24 a.m.: She wants to get another job because she needs money. She says that times are getting hard and she's trying to go to Barbados. She reiterates that she wants to be in the United States to see everyone she loves.July 28, 10:44 a.m.: She wishes for a "time machine" to rewind all the bad things that she did wrong. "I'M NEVER GOING TO BE HAPPY HERE!" she writes.
Aug. 1, 2:19 p.m.: She writes that rumors of her being dead are not true. She said that she was in a coma for about a month and is now recovered.
Aug. 2, 8:24 p.m.: She said that she misses Kimball and misses Dallas.
Aug. 4, 8:06 p.m.: She writes that she is trying to go to Mexico or Cali, Colombia. She says that she needs to be in the United States and that the closes location is Mexico. She says, "Houston I'm coming to you." She said that she also misses people in Dallas and Houston.
Jakadrien's last post was on Nov. 15 at 6:26 p.m. It read: "Well bak in a relationship with same man I broke up with, lol! I love him dearly tho!!!! I think that will never happen, mae that mistake of oing that, beause he show me that he is serious with me, an so on, so ok lol!!!!!"
Texas runaway found pregnant in Colombia after she was mistakenly deported
By Nancy Dillon / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Published: Thursday, January 5 2012, 2:18 AM
Jakadrien Turner, who ran away from home in Texas in the fall of 2010 and was mistakenly deported to Colombia by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in April of 2011. WFAA.COM
Jakadrien Turner, who ran away from home in Texas in the fall of 2010, may have been mistakenly deported to Colombia by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in April of 2011.
A Texas runaway who disappeared in 2010 was found possibly pregnant in Colombia recently after federal officials deported the teen, who doesn’t speak Spanish, a Dallas TV news station reported.
The wayward girl, who was identified only by her first name, Jakadrien, ran away from home in the fall of 2010 as her parents were going through a divorce, her grandmother, Lorene Turner, told WFAA-TV Channel 8.
Just 14 at the time, she drifted south to Houston and used a fake name when she was arrested by Houston police for theft, the news station said.
What happened from there is being investigated by the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, which challenged aspects of the TV station’s story.
The name Jakadrien had used belonged to a 22-year-old illegal immigrant from Colombia who had warrants out for her arrest, WFAA reported. Immigration officials took Jakadrien’s fingerprints, but didn't confirm her identity, before shipping the non-Spanish speaker off to South America last April, the station reported.
But an ICE official told the Daily News that Jakadrien maintained the false identity throughout the deportation procedure. The official said Jakadrien fabricated the identity and that there wasn’t another young woman with the fabricated name who was wanted on outstanding warrants.
A search for Jakadrien involving Dallas police and federal officials eventually led to a Colombian address, and U.S. Embassy officials asked local police to pick her up, the station reported. Jakadrien reportedly remains in custody in Colombia, and it’s not clear how her case will be handled.
The Dallas Morning news reported that once she arrived in Colombia, the missing teen was given full citizenship in that country.
An ICE spokesman said in a statement released late Tuesday that the agency is taking “very seriously” the allegation that it deported a U.S. citizen.
“ICE is fully and immediately investigating this matter in order to expeditiously determine the facts of this case,” said the statement by ICE Director of Public Affairs Brian Hale.
Jakadrien’s grandmother said she spent many sleepless nights searching for the missing teen on Facebook — and was shocked to learn she was found in South America.
“God just kept leading me,” Lorene Turner told WFAA. “I wake up in the middle of the night and do whatever God told me to do, and I found her."
The grandmother said Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials "didn't do their work."
"How do you deport a teenager and send her to Colombia without a passport, without anything?" she questioned.
"I feel like she will come home," the grandmother told WFAA with tears in her eyes. "I just need help and prayer."
ndillon@nydailynews.com
Tex. teen mistakenly deported to Colombia assumed false identity
By Elizabeth Flock
News agencies are reporting today that a 14-year-old American runaway was mistakenly deported to Colombia by authorities in Texas in May because she gave a fake name that accidentally matched that of another illegal alien.
Jakadrien Turner (National Center for Missing & Exploited Children's.) U.S. Immigration and Customs, however, says that’s not true. An agency spokeswoman told The Washington Post that Jakadrien Turner was deported because she assumed the false identity of a Colombian woman. Turner is now 15 and possibly being held in a detention center in Colombia.
The agency says Turner first assumed the identity, calling herself Tika Lanay Cortez, when she was arrested on state charges for theft by the Houston Police Department. Turner told police that she was an adult from Colombia with no legal status in the United States, and went through an entire trial, was charged, convicted and served time under the name Tika Lanay Cortez. Records from court indicated that it convicted a 21-year-old woman from Columbia. Her defense attorney believed that to be true as well.
Upon her conviction, ICE says Turner was referred to them, where she continued to maintain a false identity during immigration court proceedings. The agency did fingerprints and record checks to verify that the woman was Tika Lanay Cortez, and nothing came up to invalidate her claim. When she went before an immigration lawyer, Turner continued to say she was a Colombia woman. She was interviewed at the Colombian consulate, where she also kept up the false identity.
Turner was ultimately ordered removed from the United States by a Department of Justice immigration judge last year.
According to the Dallas Morning News, Turner is being held in a detention facility in Colombia. ICE says they are not able to confirm whether that was true, but said in a statement that it is “fully and immediately investigating this matter in order to expeditiously determine the facts of this case.”
Her grandmother, who is responsible for sparking the investigation after tracking Turner down on social media, told the Dallas Morning News: “How do you deport a teenager and send her to Colombia without a passport, without anything? ... I need help and I need a prayer.”
Turner, however, continued to use the false identity she assumed as Tika Cortez since being deported, on a Facebook page and on Twitter.
Turner created the Facebook page in May using the name “Tika SoloToolong (Tika Confero),” updated her current city to Bogota, Colombia, and began posting photos of herself and updates to the page. On Twitter, she created the account under the name “Tika Cortes.”
In her first Facebook post, Turner refers to her deportation, writing: “bored ... just got this facebook stuff ... pics coming soon, back home in Columbia ... got deported ... really missed everyone in Houston.”
Though Turner wrote on her Facebook page of wanting to move to Mexico to eventually return to Houston, it is unclear whether Turner made any actual attempts to come back to the United States. At one point, she writes that she was working to get a Colombian identification card.
She also referenced her jail time in Texas, and wrote that she was not happy in Colombia: “Well was in jail, now I’m free man an still feel like I’m loke [locked] up in this country.”
Many times, Turner asserted on her page that she was Colombian, saying in one post that she was born in Colombia, raised in Barbados, grew up in New Orleans and then lived in Dallas and Houston.
Elsewhere, Turner wrote she was depressed and lonely in Bogota, sometimes saying she longed to go back to Houston, and at other times saying she belonged in Colombia because it was her home.
While in Colombia, Turner worked as a maid and did other odd jobs that required an English speaker. She did not speak Spanish when she arrived but wrote on her Facebook that she was going to take Spanish lessons.
Her last update on Twitter, on Nov. 3, read: “Listening The Zone .... The Weekend Version, and right now I am in Zone to [expletive] somebody up!!!!!”
Her last Facebook post, on Nov. 15, stated that she had started a relationship with an ex-boyfriend. The man posted a few days later on her wall that he loved her and was the father of her child. CNN reports that Turner is pregnant.
ICE said in a statement released to The Post that “historically, there have been instances where ICE has seen cases of individuals providing inaccurate information regarding who they are and their immigration status.” ICE said individuals provide inaccurate information at times “for ulterior motives.”
It is unclear what Turner’s motive might be.
According to CBS affiliate KHOU, Turner ran away from home in fall 2010 after her grandfather died and her parents divorced. Her missing person report is here.
Got brown skin?? You must be an illegal!!!!
"People can slip through the cracks, especially if they don't have legal help or family members working on their behalf" I guess that means a person without any relatives or friends is screwed when it come to dealing with the INS?"Often in these situations, they have these group hearings where they tell everybody, 'You're going to be deported. Everything is really quick; even if you understand English, you wouldn't understand what is going on" Translation - you ain't going to get a fair trial or even a fair hearing from the INS. If you got dark skin that is proof you are an illegal and will be deported.
Teen who was deported to Colombia back in U.S.
by Linda Stewart Ball - Jan. 6, 2012 10:43 PM
Associated Press
DALLAS - A Texas teenager who was deported to Colombia after claiming to be an illegal immigrant was back in the United States on Friday and at the center of an international mystery over how a minor could be sent to a country where she is not a citizen.
The 15-year-old's family has questioned why U.S. officials didn't do more to verify her identity and say she is not fluent in Spanish and had no ties to Colombia. While many facts of the case involving Jakadrien Lorece Turner remain unclear, U.S. and Colombian officials have pointed fingers over who is responsible.
Immigration experts say that while cases of mistaken identity are rare, people can slip through the cracks, especially if they don't have legal help or family members working on their behalf. [So a person without any relatives or friends is screwed when it come to dealing with the INS???] But they say U.S. immigration authorities have the responsibility to determine if a person is a citizen.
"Often in these situations, they have these group hearings where they tell everybody, 'You're going to be deported,' " said Jacqueline Stevens, a political-science professor at Northwestern University who is an expert on immigration issues. "Everything is really quick; even if you understand English, you wouldn't understand what is going on. [Translation - you ain't going to get a fair trial or even a fair hearing. Got dark skin? Then you are guilty as charged and will be deported] If she were in that situation as a 14-year-old, she would be herded through like cattle and not have a chance to talk to the judge about her situation." [Again you ain't going to get a fair trial or hearing.]
Jakadrien was on a flight from Atlanta and would be in Dallas by evening, her mother, Johnisa Turner, told the Associated Press. She had said earlier that she planned to meet her daughter when she arrived in the city.
"Our day has been hectic; hers is, too," Turner said. "Just as long as she makes it home, just as long as she gets here."
Turner said she has "a gazillion questions" for Jakadrien. Federal and local officials may have plenty, as well.
The saga began when the teen ran away more than a year ago. Jakadrien's family said she left home in November 2010. Houston police said the girl was arrested on April 2, 2011, on suspicion of misdemeanor theft and claimed to be Tika Lanay Cortez, a Colombian woman born in 1990. It was unclear if she has been living under that name.
Houston police said in a statement that her name was run through a database to determine if she was wanted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, but the results were negative. She was then turned over to the Harris County jail and booked on a theft charge.
The county sheriff's office said it ran her through the available databases and did the interviews necessary to establish her identity and immigration status in the country, with negative results. A sheriff's office employee recommended that an immigration detainer be put on her, and upon her release from jail, she was turned over to ICE.
An ICE official said the teen claimed to be Cortez throughout the criminal proceedings in Houston and the ensuing deportation process, in which an immigration judge ultimately ordered her back to Colombia.
The ICE official, speaking on condition of anonymity due to not being authorized to discuss additional details of the case, said the teenager was interviewed by a representative from the Colombian consulate and that country's government issued her a travel document to enter Colombia.
Jakadrien was issued travel documents at the request of U.S. officials using information they provided, the Colombian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. Colombian officials are investigating what kind of verification was conducted by its Houston consulate to issue the temporary passport.
The girl was given Colombian citizenship upon arriving in that country, the ICE official said.
Ultimately, the girl was found in Bogota by the Dallas Police Department with help from Colombian and U.S. officials.