A backlog of over 150,000 cases continues to congest immigration courts in Mass. Everyone waiting has a story. - The Boston Globe (2024)

Do you just want to go home?

I’m afraid to go home (Asylum).

Welcome to Boston Immigration Court.

Every week, scores of people pass through the metal detectors downstairs and wait as their cases inch through the nation’s immigration system, which critics from across the political spectrum agree is a broken mess. Here, the newcomers are confronted by the morass in the most tangible way. Some have been in the United States for years, others just days. Nearly all are seeking to stay in the United States legally. The avenues are various, the system complicated, the cases protracted.

A backlog, which reached more than 150,000 cases in Massachusetts, continues to congest immigration courts here and across the country. And everyone waiting their turn to enter a courtroom has a story. Many are fleeing violence, social upheaval, political unrest, or crippled economies back home. Some look jaded, overwhelmed, or suspicious of the entire process; others, despite the stakes, maintain a sunny optimism.

Take 24-year-old Athdjordens Guerrier. He is from Gonaïves in Haiti, where he made what money he could as a street vendor because the economy is in tatters and the country in the midst of a low-scale civil war.

“It’s very unsafe right now,” Guerrier said through an interpreter. “Bandits took over the country. There’s no school. You have to hide all the time.”

He is living in Palm Bay, Fla., with his parents, but is here because Boston is where he entered the United States. He wants to transfer his case to Florida and spends more than an hour poring over and filling out legal documents. The asylum process can be a tough slog for applicants, but Guerrier projects a free-and-easy demeanor.

“No stress, because I really trust the system,” he said.

Not everyone is so carefree. Kevin Perez, 19, wore a three-piece suit, he said, out of respect for the court. He works doing cleaning and demolition. He is nervous before going before the judge. He shuffles some papers on a bench outside the court room.

He moved to the United States five years ago from Cuilco, Huehuetenango, Guatemala, with his father, who now works as a landscaper. Perez said he was fleeing an abusive mother and street violence. He lives in Springfield and is applying for permanent residency. It’s a long process, he acknowledged — he’s been here twice before.

“It would really help me to make a future, improve my quality of life,” he said through an interpreter.

He remains connected to his family in Guatemala. The oldest of four, he misses his sister and two brothers. He would like to study, have a career of some sort. Depending on how things shake out, he may join the Army, he said.

Only slices of life stories emerge. Anecdotes of police corruption, societal decay, and sexual violence. Most of the picture remains outside the frame.

Some declined to be interviewed, focused instead on the task at hand. Often, when someone leaves a courtroom, they don’t have time to talk; they’re running off to catch a train or bus, or a ride home from a friend, to go to work.

Inside the courtrooms, the system grinds on. There is more waiting on wooden benches and signs reminding people not to record the proceedings. Some cases are conducted virtually, with immigrants beamed in from jails onto screens set to the side of the judge. Some face accusations of driving without a license or overstaying their visa. Others, like Guerrier, are trying to move their case closer to where they live. One man wants to unite his immigration case with his wife’s. The court obliges.

In many instances, those before the court do not have an attorney and have to fend for themselves. The cases can move slowly. For some, their next court date will be in 2025.

Communication with the judge is often through an interpreter. Questions abound: Where can I find an attorney? Why did border patrol pull me over? Sometimes the judge must press for specifics: Where exactly did you lose your passport? Who precisely is threatening you? What is your new address?

“Is there anything you want me to go over again?” Judge Sarah Cade asked in one hearing.

For some, confusion reigns. Back in the waiting room is Silvio Antonio Perez, 33, who grew up in the Dominican Republic. When asked why he is here, he shrugged, telling an interpreter that he received notification in the mail to show up to court. Beyond that, he said in Spanish, “I don’t know what I’m doing exactly. No idea.” He brandishes a piece of paper that showed he surrendered to immigration authorities at Eagle Pass, Texas. He’s in Boston because he has a sister here, he said.

In his hometown, “there was no money.” And if you were able to make some money, gangsters were ready to relieve you of such gains, he said. He was a truck driver, but his license doesn’t transfer to the United States. He’d like to find a good job: “I’ll do whatever.”

“I really miss being able to work,” he said. “Back home, it’s work, work, work.”

Mirtha Doret can no longer work, or, not like she used to. Doret, 48, is from Miragoâne, Haiti. There, she couldn’t find a job and “it wasn’t safe.” She came to Greater Boston in August to join her mother and other relatives living here. She was working in a local kitchen but suffered an electric shock while at work, which caused nerve damage, immobilizing an arm.

She currently lives in Salisbury. She has four children; three are in the Dominican Republic, the other is in Mexico, she said. They are there because Haiti is so unstable, but she is concerned her children are also unsafe in the countries they’ve fled to. Her injury has made the task of laying the foundations to bring them here, to safety, much harder.

Tatiana Peralta, a 31-year-old Ecuadorian, looked both exhausted and guarded. She and her partner, who declined to give his name, took a bus from New York, where they are staying in a shelter. It’s unclear why their cases are being processed in Massachusetts; they assume it’s because the immigration courts in New York are overwhelmed.

They trekked through the jungles of Central America to the United States. Peralta said she witnessed a gang rape during that journey, which she describes as life-altering.

“For a lot of other people, they never made it, or it took them longer, or we don’t know what happened,” she said through an interpreter.

Peralta said she was physically assaulted in New York, beaten so badly she was hospitalized. Now, she said, she has a hospital bill she can’t afford to pay.

Her partner said corrupt immigration authorities in Mexico turned him over to a drug cartel in Durango, where he was held captive for eight days until his family could fork over a ransom. In the third-floor waiting room, he played solitaire on his phone. They both are seeking asylum, but are informed they are due in immigration court in Chelmsford, not Boston. Now they have to somehow get to another court house 30 miles away, without a car, no English language skills, and limited cash.

Peralta’s saga is far from over. She has three children still in Ecuador.

“We’ll have to bring the smallest one first, when we can, and then the others,” she said.

Leidiane Lopes is a landscaper on Martha’s Vineyard. She’s been in the United States for 17 months. She is at court to see if she can apply for asylum and is hoping to retain legal representation, she said through an interpreter. Back in her native Brazil, people are friendlier, she said. She finds New Englanders to be standoffish by comparison.

By happenstance, she runs into Rosiane Franca, a cleaner who lives on Cape Cod, whom she knows because both were detained in the same facility on the southern border after they crossed into the United States. They are unsure of names of the facilities. Franca was first locked up in Texas and then transferred to Arizona after a “coyote” had ushered her over the border from Mexico. In Arizona, she was detained in a small room with 30 other women. One of them was Lopes. Sometimes they were only allowed a shower or two a week and Lopes said she was often hungry.

Still, Franca describes the immigration process in the United States as “a good experience.” The economy was bad in Minas Gerais, where she is from, she said, as was the violence. She knew people who were kidnapped or assaulted. For her, it’s important to have a sense of security.

“A new life,” she said.

Danny McDonald can be reached at daniel.mcdonald@globe.com. Follow him @Danny__McDonald.