Immigrant receives residency due to his son's disability

Published: 2006-04-05

PHOENIX (CNS) -- After immigration Judge John W. Richardson granted his request for permanent legal residency, Mario Gutierrez wept. "I'm not one who cries easily," he said. "I don't know if it was the emotion or what, but I couldn't even talk." Richardson's decision March 16 ended Gutierrez's four-year battle in the Arizona courts that included one rejection of his application to stay in the country permanently. The tide apparently turned in his favor after he consulted an attorney with Catholic Charities' immigration services who learned about his son's disability. His 5-year-old son, also named Mario, suffers from a cerebral disorder that causes hyperactivity. The boy takes medicine to go to sleep every night because his brain doesn't tell his body when he's tired. The judge granted the senior Gutierrez permanent legal residency because if he were deported it would have caused the extreme suffering of a U.S. citizen, Gutierrez said. "The lawyer said that if Mario went to Mexico he would lose medical assistance provided by the government," he said. "There isn't a program like that for him in Mexico."

Copyright (c) 2006 Catholic News Service /U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. The CNS news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed, including but not limited to such means as framing or any other digital copying or distribution method, in whole or in part without the prior written authority of Catholic News Service .