Meet the Kentucky veteran trying to reunite a migrant family separated by Remain in Mexico

Sep. 22--There was something odd about the Kentucky woman who sat next to a young Honduran mother asking for asylum in San Diego's immigration court last week.

Judge Philip Law had never seen her before. The woman wasn't an immigration lawyer. She wasn't even related to the single mother, Keyla.

So, the judge asked, who was she and what was she doing there?

"I'm Vonnette Monteith," she said. "I know the family and I'm here to help."

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Monteith's long journey from Louisville to that San Diego courtroom began last December, at St. Williams Catholic Church.

After the service, a member of the congregation stood up and asked for help. A Honduran refugee already living in Louisville had more family at the southwestern border. Her family fled gang-controlled territory and hoped to find refuge in the United States.

The woman asked someone to sponsor the refugee's family so that they could all be together in Kentucky.

Monteith, a former Army Lieutenant colonel, doesn't speak Spanish but she did have two spare rooms. So she offered to take them in.

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"I have a hard time saying no," she said.

She sponsored eight people including a family made up of Keyla's mother, step-father and two teenage stepbrothers. They left Honduras after MS-13 killed the boys' grandmother because she interfered with their recruitment efforts.

When the group moved in, Monteith communicated with them exclusively through translation apps on her phone. She soon discovered that she and the mother, Mirna, had a lot in common.

Both were born just a few months apart in 1968. Their children were around the same age and both were religious.

Monteith noticed that Mirna prayed every day. She would often pray -- and cry -- for her daughter Keyla. She hadn't made it to Kentucky.

Keyla and her 4-year-old daughter were the last of the family to leave Honduras. By the time she reached the southwest border in February, the Trump administration began implementing a new policy called Migrant Protection Protocols, more commonly known as Remain in Mexico.

The policy requires asylum seekers to live in Mexico while waiting for their immigration court hearings. For Keyla, that means she's stuck in Mexicali while her family is in Louisville.

"It's very sad what they are doing to us," she said. "It's hard to be away from my family. I miss them very much."

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When Monteith found out about the family separation, she did everything she could to help.

First, she drove almost 2,000 miles from Louisville to Mexicali, where Keyla had prepared copies of important legal documents including police reports of her husband's murder to prove her asylum case.

Keyla asked Monteith to help find an immigration lawyer.

Asylum seekers enrolled in Remain in Mexico have struggled to find legal representation. Data shows that less than 1.5 percent of migrants enrolled in the program have lawyers.

Migrants who don't find attorneys must represent themselves and are significantly more likely to lose their cases, data shows.

Keyla knew this, which is why she made finding a lawyer her top priority.

So Monteith drove to Los Angeles, hoping to find nonprofits willing to take Keyla's case. She called, emailed, tracked down law offices, but struck out.

"The thing that was so disappointing was that out of all of these organizations out there helping immigrants, none of them called me back," she said. "I went to L.A. and walked all over and emailed, and emailed, and emailed. If I, who understands the language and knows how to call and email, can't get help, how are they getting help?"

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She continued the search in Kentucky and eventually convinced Mirna's lawyer to also represent Keyla as well.

That lawyer, Kristen Barrow, was hesitant at first.

Remain in Mexico cases are being heard almost exclusively in immigration courts along the border. The Louisville-based attorney had never represented someone enrolled in the program and was concerned about the logistics and costs of representing a client 2,000 miles away in Mexico.

How would she find the time to meet with Keyla in Mexicali? Would the law firm be able to afford the travel costs? What about the rest of her case load?

Monteith offered to serve as a volunteer and even travel to Mexico and San Diego on her own dime.

"She is a miracle worker," Barrow said.

From Louisville, Barrow filed a motion in San Diego to be able represent Keyla via phone. But she never got an answer.

Monteith decided to go to San Diego herself and ask for a telephonic hearing in person. That's how she ended up in Judge Law's courtroom earlier this month.

The day of the hearing, Barrow called the clerk to ask if she was going to be able to phone in. But she said the clerk told her that there was nothing he could do because court was already in session. So she waited by the phone and hoped that Monteith could speak with the judge.

In the courtroom, Judge Law said he had approved the motion for the telephonic hearing. That approval had never made it to Louisville though.

Monteith asked the judge to call Barrow, which he did. From her law office in Kentucky, she spoke to an immigration judge in San Diego about an asylum case from Honduras.

It was a small and short-lived victory.

Barrow's main plan was to ask the judge to move the case to Louisville's immigration court and consolidate Keyla's case with her mother's.

However, the judge denied the motion because the immigration court in Louisville has been closed since August 15.

It turns out the elevators in that building are broken, so the entire court is closed until someone repairs it. Barrow said the court is scheduled to reopen sometime in October.

"It's just really, really bad timing," she said.

Meanwhile, Keyla was sent back to Mexico until her next hearing on Nov. 21.

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