Massachusetts immigration activist Eduardo Samaniego denied release on bond from ICE detention

Former Hampshire College student and activist Eduardo Samaniego was denied release on bond from an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Georgia on Thursday, according to Rose Bookbinder from the Pioneer Valley Workers Center in Northampton.

The center is calling for his release and asking people to sign a petition. Samaniego was working for the center before he went to Georgia this fall.

Samaniego had been held in the Robert A. Deyton Detention Facility in Lovejoy, Georgia, for 71 days. On Friday he was moved to the Irwin Detention Center in Ocilla, Georgia. Bookbinder said his legal team was given less than 24 hours notice of his Thursday hearing. They plan to appeal.

She said the lawyers reported the court deemed Samaniego a flight risk. She said because they didn't have much notice they didn't have a large support team to testify on his behalf.

A GoFundMe campaign continues to raise money for his legal fees.

Bookbinder said Samaniego's health is precarious. He was injured in a gas explosion two years ago, suffering burns on 45 percent of his body and being hospitalized for three months.

The trauma of that, plus the fact that he has been isolated in detention, is causing him great difficulty, Bookbinder said. She said he wasn't allowed visitors, including someone from the Mexican consulate. A guard allowed his mother to visit two days ago, Bookbinder said.

Samaniego, an undocumented immigrant who came to the U.S. from Mexico when he was 16, graduated with honors as president of Junior Achievement of Georgia, president of the Hispanic Honor Society and the only National Society of High School Scholars gold medal winner in his class.

He said in an earlier interview he couldn't go to college because he didn't have a Social Security number. In 2014, Hampshire gave him a four-year scholarship.

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