Family of immigrant pizza deliveryman Pablo Villavicencio celebrates legal win New York Daily News
1 hr ago
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The two young daughters of a pizza deliveryman facing deportation are overjoyed their father was given a last-minute reprieve.
“They look different today and I’m happy for that,” Sandra Chica, the wife of Pablo Villavicencio, said Sunday.
Her husband was taken into federal custody on June 1 by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents as he delivered a pizza to Fort Hamilton Army Base in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.
Villavicencio, 35, an Ecuadorian native, was arrested after a military staffer on the base discovered a 2009 deportation order against him.
On Saturday, Manhattan Federal Court Judge Alison Nathan put Villavicencio’s imminent deportation on hold. Villavicencio’s lawyer argued that he was “abruptly detained by ICE following apparent ethnic profiling while he was working.”
The filing included multiple letters written by top elected officials and supporters opposing his deportation.
His wife on Sunday thanked the Daily News and others for bringing attention to his plight.
“Yesterday we tried one more time to stop my husband’s deportation,” Chica, an American citizen, told The News. “In the afternoon we were informed about the good news and now we want to thank all of you for your help and support.” “Pablo is positive,” she added. “He just wants to kiss and hold his babies. Now the lawyers are working on his case.”
Before his arrest, Villavicencio, and his wife, lived in Hempstead, L.I., with their two daughters, Luciana, 3, and Antonia, 2.
He remains at an ICE detention facility in New Jersey until the case is adjudicated.
Poster Comment:
My only question is how did they find out he had a deportation order on him since 2009? They would need to know his name.