Friday, January 6, 2012

Mistakenly Deported Teen Has Landed Back on US Soil

 

 

An undated photo of Jakadrien Lorece Turner.

Your Black World reports.

Jakadrien Turner, the 15-year old girl who was accidentally deported to Colombia, has returned to the United States.  She was sent to the country in May after she gave a false name to authorities, who then determined that she was an illegal immigrant.

Johnisa Turner, the girl’s mother, said that Jakadrien was on a flight from Atlanta.  She is planning to meet with her daughter so she can ask “a gazillion questions.”

"I am very excited," Turner said. "I feel like a weight has been lifted. But at the same time, I won't just feel really, really good until I'm able to touch her. Until I'm able to put her in my arms."

Some have wondered how the young girl was accidentally deported.  US and Colombian officials are blaming one another on who should be held responsible for deporting a minor to a foreign country.   Jakadrien’s family is wondering why US officials didn’t do a better job of confirming her identity before sending her away.

Victoria Nuland, a spokeswoman for the State Department, said that the case got their attention in December.

"We didn't have any involvement at all in this case until it came to light that there may be a problem with an American minor in Colombia, and that — and then we became involved both with Colombian authorities and with folks in Dallas," Nuland said.

The girl ran away from home more than a year ago, and was discovered in Bogota, Colombia.  She was enrolled in the “Welcome Home" program after she arrived in the country.  From that point, she was given a place to live and a job.  When the government determined that she was a US citizen and a minor, they put her in their welfare program.

She was not fluent in Spanish, and her grandmother hunted her down on Facebook.

"She looks like a kid, she acts like a kid. How could they think she wasn't a kid?" said Lorene Turner, the girl’s grandmother.

5 comments:

Open Fist said...

Can we please stop acting like the girl is completely innocent? She gave a fake name that happened to be the same as someone they wanted to deport. Maybe now she'll learn not to lie. She was not some goody two shoes. Spare me the "what if she were your daughter" shaming tactic, because if she were mine, I'd take a belt to her as soon as she got back. I think a better focus of energy would be to focus on the issues that led her to run away in the first place. Does the girl need to see a shrink? Do her parents? Sounds like Grandma was the only real adult in her life.

Anonymous said...

in short: she probably left U.S.A. with her Columbiano beau on a romantic adventure only discovering later that her Columbiano beau in no longer playing his "Beauty & the Beast role...now she knocked up...snaps into reality and acknowledge that the Walt Disney classical tale's are not what she believed it to be after all.

Anonymous said...

Thank goodness for grandmothers who never give up on their grandkids and then thank goodness for facebook. If it did not exist, she may not have been found. M

Anonymous said...

First of all it was the U.S. responiblity to make sure that her fingerprints were checked we dropped the ball end of story

Anonymous said...

Open fist, Iam sure you were 15 once in your life you never lied She is 15 and needed help not deportation.She could have really had a problem there in Colombia not knowing spanish. We should thank that country for taking care of our Citizen of the United States