Florida press reports over the weekend said that an immigration judge has ordered that a West Palm Beach man born in The Bahamas to Haitian parents be deported to Haiti, a land he has reportedly never seen.
According to the Palm Beach Post, Steven Altidor, 24, moved to Palm Beach County with his family when he was four or five years old.
The young man reportedly beat another man and stole his wallet and also violated his probation.
The report says that the United States originally planned to deport him to The Bahamas, but that request was rejected given that Altidor does not have Bahamian citizenship because both his parents are Haitian.
Under Bahamian law, Altidor had the option of applying for citizenship when he turned 18, but Florida was said to be his only home.
The Palm Beach Post also reports that his parents worry that his deportation to Haiti would be a death sentence.
“I feel so bad,” the manﾴs father, Wilner Altidor, was quoted in the paper on Saturday as saying. “They say that they are going to send him to Haiti. But he does not know Haiti.”
He also said that he would like to see his son deported to The Bahamas as opposed to Haiti.
The jailed manﾴs father, according to the report, was ordained a Minister in The Bahamas and works at a West Palm Beach discount store.
His son was being held in a Florida detention centre until his appeal is decided, the Palm Beach Post said.
The Bahama Journal
