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A 15-year-old migrant man who was housed in a large shelter near the southern tip of Texas left his office on Saturday and disappeared in the border area, officials said.
The shelter, a former Walmart in Brownsville, Texas, which has been transformed into the country's largest child care center, has been the subject of close scrutiny, with children separated from their children. parents under President Trump's "zero tolerance" policy. The.
On Sunday, the non-profit group Southwest Key Programs, which runs the center known as Casa Padre, confirmed that the teenager was gone.
The news of a teenager's departure came as company officials sought to reassure members of Congress and the media who had visited the center that the approximately 1,500 boys aged 10 to 17 were well cared for and closely watched.
A Southwest Key spokesman, Jeff Eller, said Sunday that he could not legally compel children to stay on the premises they were looking to leave, and that "occasionally" children had left many of his 27 shelters.
"We are not a detention center," Eller said in a statement. "We talk to them and try to make them stay in. If they leave the property, we call the law enforcement."
Federal officials echoed this stance, saying that they could not arrest a child who was trying to leave. Officials did not answer a question about the number of children who had left migration centers at the national level.
Mr. Eller said that less than 1% of all children who went through the Southwest Key centers left, although he refused to provide specific numbers.
The revelation that children can leave these centers by themselves has raised a host of questions about the shelter system: what about their immigration procedures? how family members can meet; whether they can bypass the long process of approving the release of a parent or sponsor; and who is responsible for their safety, especially in a region like the Rio Grande Valley, one of the busiest corridors for human trafficking.
Michelle Brané, Director of the Migrant Rights and Justice Program The Women's Refugee Commission, a research and defense organization, said that if groups like Southwest Key could not act in law enforcement and did not have the power to " to attack a child and to control him ", the authorities must call the authorities. they are technically in federal custody.
It is possible that the children who leave simply want to "go find their parents," she said, adding, "If the children run away, it raises questions about the care that is provided."
Mr. Eller stated that the teenager left Casa Padre at 3 pm Saturday and did not come back. The staff members tried to keep the boy there, as they do with all the kids who want to leave, he said.
"It's a conversation, a conversation that we're here to help you, we're here to help you come back with your family," he said. "We can not help you if you decide to leave."
The teenager's departure was reported to the Brownsville Police, who did not respond to requests for comments on Sunday.
Federal officials said the boy only showed up at the border. If the teenager is found, he will return to the custody of the Department of Homeland Security and be returned to the refugee resettlement office, officials said.
Tony Martinez, the Mayor of Brownsville, said that he could not remember a previous case of a child who is moving away from Casa Padre.
"If the establishment was such a good idea, why are they trying to get out of it?", He said Sunday. "Most people who escape, they escape from prisons.They escape from jails, because it's not a fun place.I can just imagine what could cross the head of this young man, at 15: "What am I doing here?
Representative Filemon B. Vela Jr., a Democrat who represents Brownsville, visited Casa Padre with other Democrats and stated that it was "difficult to understand how a child could escape the facility. "
"For now, we can only pray for the well-being of the child and hope that the authorities can find him," he said.
The controversy surrounding Mr. Trump's immigration policy erupted after the federal government announced that it would enforce a "zero tolerance" policy to prosecute all adults who have illegally crossed the border or attempted to do it.
After intense public pressure, Mr. Trump Signing an executive order on Wednesday meant ending the separation of families at the border by holding them together for an indefinite term instead.
On Saturday, the government declared that it had brought together 522 migrant children separated from adults and that it was seeking to reunite the more than 2,000 other children held in federal prisons who were also separated.
The Casa Padre Shelter, a state-licensed daycare, is home to two undocumented youth: those who have been separated from their loved ones by the Trump Administration's separation policy and those, such as the Lt.-Gen. missing teenager, who illegally crossed the border without being accompanied by a parent or guardian. The majority were unaccompanied youths.
Melissa Gomez and Matt Stevens contributed to the story.
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