A 64-year-old Iranian woman, who has lived in the US for 47 years, was detained by immigration agents on Sunday morning while gardening outside her home inNew Orleans.
According to a witness, plainclothes officers in unmarked vehicles handcuffed Madonna “Donna” Kashanian and transported her to a Mississippi jail before transferring her to the South Louisiana Ice processing center in Basile, reportsNola.
Kashanian arrived in the US in 1978 on a student visa and later applied for asylum, citing fears of persecution due to her father’s ties to the US-backed Shah of Iran. Her asylum request was ultimately denied, but she was granted a stay of removal on the condition she comply with immigration requirements, a condition her family says she always met.
She has no criminal record but remains in Ice custody.
The timing of Kashanian’s detention came just hours after US airstrikesin Iran. Federal officials did not comment on her specific case, though the DHS released a statement highlighting the arrests of 11 Iranians nationwide over the weekend, according to Nola.
Kashanian had moved to New Orleans as a teenager and built a life over four decades. She often shared Persian recipes on YouTube and was active in her daughter’s schools.
Her family said Kashanian had long feared deportation, especially after Trump’s election. She attempted to adjust her status through marriage to a US citizen, but was denied due to a past marriage the government deemed fraudulent.
Neighbors told Nola that Kashanian’s arrest lasted less than a minute. Later that day, she briefly called her family during processing. The family didn’t hear from her again until Tuesday.
Since then, her husband and daughter have been scrambling to find legal help, a challenging task due to the high number of detainees and limited immigration attorneys in Louisiana.
Ice also arrested two Iranian LSU students in Baton Rouge at their off-campus apartment earlier this week. Last week, Ice announced that they arrested 84 peopleduring a raidat a south-west Louisiana racetrack. Of the 84, Ice said “at least two” had criminal records.
Statistics from early June, previouslyreported onby the Guardian, demonstrated an 807% increase in arrests of people without criminal histories since before Donald Trump’s second inauguration this January. Data suggests Ice is holdingabout 59,000detainees in facilities across the country.