The case was brought to the attention of the son of 86-year-old woman Marie-Thérèse, originally from Nantes, who was arrested by ICE in April in Anniston, Alabama. “They handcuffed her hands and feet as if she were a dangerous criminal,” the son told Ouest France.
The woman moved to the United States to join ex-soldier Billy, whom she met during the 1960s at the American military base in Saint-Nazaire, where she worked as a secretary.
However, she lost contact with him in 1966, after the soldier returned to the US. Both then got married and had children in their countries. In 2010, however, they met again and regularly visited with their other halves, as the British website BBC recalled.
They were in love as teenagers
By coincidence, they both became widows in 2022 and decided to go together. “They were in love as teenagers,” said the son of the detained woman. They got married last year and the French woman moved to Alabama, where she applied for a green card (residence permit).
Last year, however, Billy died suddenly and his son and Marie-Thérèse had disputes over the inheritance. He allegedly threatened her and finally had her disconnected from water, electricity and the Internet.
Just one day before the planned inheritance trial, for which the senior citizen hired a lawyer, she was detained by ICE agents and neighbors immediately alerted her children, who asked the French consulate in Atlanta for help.
“Mom is a fighter and she is holding on bravely, but at the same time she has health problems with her heart and back. In such conditions she will not last even a month,” he explained when he visited her mother, saying that he was trying to get her released to France.
“It’s like a bad movie. Every morning I wake up and say to myself that none of this is true, that it was just a nightmare,” he added.
