German tourist detained by ICE says she spent week in solitary confinement

Otay Mesa, Calif – A German tourist struggles to be released from an immigration detention center after she was denied entry at the San Diego border and taken into custody of ICE last month.

“I just want to come home, you know? I’m really desperate, ”Jessica Brösche told Team 10 in a telephone interview from detention.

US customs and border protection withheld the German tattoo artist after she tried to enter San Diego on January 25^Th From Tijuana with his American best friend. The two traveled with tattoo equipment.

“I’m like, can you send her to Mexico? They are like, no, she has no legal stay. We will deport her to Germany. She will call you in three to five days, ”said Nikita Loffving, who lives in Los Angeles and crossed the border to Brösche.

Like the two presented with inspection, Loffving said a customs duty marked a problem with Brösche entering the United States with the ESTA Visa Waiver program.

“Finally, after two hours, I get a call from Jessica … say,” Hi, they accuse me of working the last time I got on my esta and they will deport me to Germany. “

Brösche told Team 10 that she spent days detained in a cell at the San Diego border before she was taken into custody by ICE. The agency then brought her to Otay Mesa withholding center, where she has now been for over a month.

She said she spent eight brutal days in lonely inclusion in the plant.

“It was terrible. As it is really terrible, ”she told Team 10 Investigation Reporter Austin Grabish in a phone interview.

Loffving tried to get help from the German Consulate in Los Angeles and said she felt hopeless when her friend was sitting in isolation without a blanket or pillow.

“She says it was like a horror movie. They screamed in all different rooms. After nine days, she said she went so crazy that she started beating the walls, and then she has blood on her knuckles, ”Lofving said.

Staff at the private withholding facility then brought a psychologist, Lofving said.

“This psychologist tries to prescribe her anti-psychotic medication. She denies the medicine. “She says, ‘I don’t want medicine. I just want to either be deported and go home, or just not be in a room alone because this is not cool. ” ‘

Loffving, who lived in Berlin with Brösche, has set posters near the German Consulate in Los Angeles, who says free Jessy now!

Withholding center rejecting lonely demands

After this story was published, Corecivic, the company that owns the Otay Mesa Detention Center, told Team 10 that Brösche “was not in any kind of restrictive housing for eight days.”

Corecivic spokesman Brian Todd said the company sometimes uses restrictive housing for medical and mental health observation, protection or investigative purposes.

“Lonely inclusion, whether it is as an expression or in practice, does not exist in any of the facilities we drive,” Todd said.

Immigration lawyer calls the case unusual

US customs and border protection spokesman Antonio Baños Arauz said privacy concerns prevent the agency from discussing a particular case.

He explained that if a foreign citizen is found declining to the United States and does not provide evidence of residence in Mexico, CBP will allow the person to book travel back to his homeland.

“If the foreign citizen is unable to do so, he or she will be transferred to the custody of immigration and customs enforcement (ICE),” Arauz said.

San Diego immigration lawyer Tammy Lin said it was unusual for Brösche to be detained.

“Typically, they will ask the person, will you withdraw the recording? They say, yes, they will just release them on the way. “

She said this is the second German citizen, she is aware of who was denied entry at the border with San Diego-Mexico recently.

“She had all her documents, all similar. They did not detain her, they let her go, and then she tried again and they let her back. “

ICE says tourist violated ‘admission conditions’

Lin said she is aware that other foreign nationals have problems coming into the US

“I know that many people in the first few weeks of the new presidency were reversed, what usually did not want. They had permission to come in or have traveled back and forth without any problems. “

Brösche has since been released from lonely inclusion and said she is in a much better mood but is desperate to return to Europe.

“I don’t really understand why it takes so long to get back to Germany.”

Ice -speaker Sandra Grisolia said in a statement Friday night Brösche’s detention is related to “violation of the conditions and conditions of her admission.”

“All foreigners who are in violation of US immigration legislation may be subject to arrest, detention and, if found removable by final order, removal from the United States, regardless of nationality,” she said.

The German Consulate is aware of her case and is in close contact with the US authorities and Brösche’s family, said Danijel Sklelja, the Deputy Consul General in a statement.