A British father held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention says he has been “treated like a murderer” after being taken from his American wife and their twin sons.
Connor Read, originally from Chatham, Kent, has lived in Florida since the age of nine, but the Department of Homeland Security is now seeking to deport him.
The 29-year-old has been detained for more than seven weeks at a centre in Louisiana, where he says he has been held alongside men arrested on allegations including drug trafficking and domestic abuse.
Mr Read was detained by four ICE agents during a green card interview on June 3, while his wife, Jaelin, 25, and their two sons, Ryder and Ozzie, waited at the immigration centre.
He was arrested and taken out of the Tampa Bay building shortly afterward, before immigration officials informed Mrs Read that he would not be returning home.
Mr Read said he then spent eight days in a “dirty” and “horrible” shared cell at Pinellas County Jail in Florida, where breakfast was served at 2am.
He was later flown to Louisiana with his hands and legs restrained, an experience he likened to “transporting a bunch of murderers.”
Mrs Read said the couple’s three-year-old twin boys refused to leave the Tampa Bay waiting room after learning their father had been arrested.
Connor Read, 29, has spent more than seven weeks in a detention centre after he was seized by ICE
Mr Read was ripped away from his wife, Jaelin, 25, and his twin sons, Ozzie and Ryder, both three
The father-of-two, originally from Chatham in Kent moved with his mother and step-father to the US aged nine
‘Ozzie just planted his butt and was like: “No, I’m waiting for Daddy,” and sat back down in the waiting room after they separated us,’ she told The Times.
‘Ryder took off towards the metal detectors. It was a mess. There were 150 people in this waiting room. It was a genuine nightmare.
‘I’m carrying a wad of paperwork we had prepared for the last two and a half weeks before this appointment. They didn’t even have a look at any of it. It felt like such a ruse.’
Mr Read moved to the US with his mother and stepfather where he has lived for more than 20 years.
However, an arrest for taking a bag of beers to a party nearly a decade ago along with other smaller crimes is the reason for Mr Read’s attempted deportation.
Mrs Read shared a heartfelt Facebook post on July 4, a month since her husband was detained.
The post read: ‘For those asking how I’m doing, I spend a lot of my time with my children at home, cleaning, cooking, tending to their every request and answering a lot of questions about their daddy.
Mr Read smiles with his identical twin sons, Ozzie and Ryder, as they pose for a picture on a bed
Mr Read moved to the US with his mother and stepfather where he has lived for more than 20 years
‘Some days, we wake up and get ready for the day and they ask if we’re getting ready to pick him up.
‘It breaks my heart to see these boys want for someone who’s been here their entire life. Some days are harder than others but we stay afloat.’
She added: ‘We have decisions to make in the background that are very difficult and crushing as we are facing the off-chance of his deportation.’
A GoFundMe set up to support Mrs Read and her twin sons, while her husband is detained, has raised more than £4,500.
Mr Read is one of 51,000 undocumented migrants being held in ICE since the start of July.
The last time the number of migrants held in ICE detention was higher was in September 2019.
