FORKS — About 60 people protested Saturday in the wake of U.S. Border Patrol detention of Forks residents, including a recent high school honors graduate and a 16-year-old boy.
“Border Patrol Terrorizes Children!” read one sign held outside the Transit Center on South Forks Avenue.
“Honk if you support immigration,” said another.
“Edgar lost his chance,” said a sign held by Nenita Bocanegra.
“He was sent back to Mexico,” Bocanegra said. “I got sad . . . and we made a sign for him.”
Edgar Ayala, a Forks High School athlete who graduated with honors in June, was arrested during a Border Patrol checkpoint near Forks on Aug. 20, said Forks Mayor Nedra Reed.
Since then, he has been returned to his father in Mexico, she said Friday.
He had been in the United States since infancy, she added.
Meanwhile, 16-year-old Carlos Bernabe was in federal detention in the Seattle area, said Border Patrol, spokesman Michael Bermudez in Seattle.
Lorie Dankers, spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Seattle, said she was not certain which facility the youth was in.
The boy could be released to a relative, Reed said, but his stepmother “would not go to pick him up because she was an illegal.
“I found out that his family, out of fear, have returned to Mexico,” she said.
Bernabe’s father was in Mexico, she said, and the teenager had lived in the United States.
“He’s scheduled to appear before an immigration judge to determine what to do with this child,” Reed said.
“What I’ve been trying to do for the last two days is get hold of someone and find out if they will release him to someone in town.
“I have someone who will take care of this child.”
