Regarding the April 4 article, “Advocates press immigrant’s case to feds,” I add my voice to urge those who have not yet sent a letter in his support to do so immediately.
I’m a retired professor of Spanish at the University of Massachusetts, so I can talk with Lucio directly, and have done so on several visits with him. I came with one of his “minders” at the First Congregational Church, and on each visit we brought a hot lunch and shared it with Lucio.
He told us about his rural home in Guatemala, of his time in the U.S., of the horrendous working conditions in the chicken-processing plants of the South where he spent over seven years, of his wife and children, and his concern about their well-being now that he cannot be with them on a daily basis.
After about two hours I had to leave, so I bade him goodbye, left the church, got into my car and drove home. And then it hit me that Lucio is unable to do any of these: he can’t walk out of First Church, he can’t drive away, and he can’t go home. Think about it.
I urge you to make the effort to write a letter on his behalf.
Nina M. Scott
Amherst