My name is X. I am 33 years old and am from Honduras. I have five children (girls) in Honduras; they are 17, 13, 10 and
the youngest one is 8 years old. I left Honruras because I wanted to provide them a house and give them the opportunity
to go to school. I also wanted to help my family a little. I had thought of crossing to the United States with an aunt who
had before attempted to cross, but she only got as far as Tamaulipas, Mexico. She told me she would go, but she never
decided. When I decided to cross to the USA I decided to go with two friends from my same village whom I knew since
we were infants- two brothers.
I left in May of 2012 and crossed into Guatemala by bus with my friends. We crossed the river (I do not know the name)
in Guatemala by boat to get to Mexico. Through information from other immigrants who were intending to cross, we got to
know a man who used to cross other people. He gave us a place to stay that night and helped us cross on his boat. He
got us up at 4:00 a.m. and we crossed the river without any problem. We walked all day on the 17th until we got to
Tenosique. We then crossed into Mexico by train; the Beast as it is called. In Tenosique we took the first train at 6:00
p.m. We traveled a lot on that train until we got to Coatzacoalcos. We waited there the following day to catch another
train. That night we slept along the road. We took the train the following day; I believe it was May 20. That train left us
before getting to Orizaba. We stayed in Orizaba a day and a half, on that same line by the side of the road. From there
we took another train that took us to Lecheria. In Lecheria we got to the immigrant house where we bathed. We had
gotten to that house by following others who had gotten off the train. We bathed, ate, and returned to the train to wait for
another train. We caught that one the following day about 3:00 a.m.
We were on that train until we got to San Luis Potosi on May 28th. We slept at the immigrant house that night and the
following day one of the men I was traveling with called X, a man who takes people to the United States. He picked us up
at the migrant house and we went to his house on May 29. From X’s house, the guys I was traveling with called their
family in the US so that they would pay X for crossing us to the USA. They were taken across seven days after our arrival
at X’s house. It was about June 5. X was charging $3700 dollars per person. I did not cross with them because my
family was telling me to wait until they would send me the money, but they never sent me anything. I was in X’s house in
San Luis for three months. He allowed me to stay in his house because he was waiting all that time for my family to send
the money. It was there that I met another girl from El Salvador. The man whose house I was staying at let us make calls
to family in Houston (they were the ones sending me the money) and gave us the opportunity to stay in his house all that
time. The Salvadoran woman and I helped him by making dinner for the other migrants who arrived. He was a very quiet
man and never mistreated us. The Salvadoran woman and I and I looked for work but they would ask us for documents
everywhere. I decided to continue walking, boarding the Beast, until we arrived at Saltillo, Coahuila on September 9. We
were in Saltillo until September 17. We stayed at a migrant house there. Then, once again, we got on the Beast. We
wanted to go along the border to Matamoros and arrive in El Paso, TX, but we mistakenly took the train that was going to
Mexicali. We arrived in Mexicali on September 26. On the train that took us to Mexicali, there was a young man from
Guatemala, two from Honduras; and one from El Salvador. We had met the one from El Salvador and the ones from
Honduras at the migrant house in Saltillo. The Guatemalan man we met when we got on the train. Thank God, we did
not witness anything bad on the entire trip. When we arrived in Mexicali, September 26 th, 2012, everyone went their own
way and I never knew anything more about them. Only the Salvadoran woman and I remained.
In Mexicali we asked a man where we could find shelter and he directed us to the migrant house on Michoacan Street,
Pueblo Nuevo. We looked for work for two months, but could not find any because we did not have any documents.
They would send us to prostitute houses because we would find work there without papers, but we said we would not go
there. X, a man who was at the migrant house, took us to a candy store where we got work. The owner was named X,
and she told us that within one week she was going to give us work. Yes, she gave me work first at the beginning of
November, about the 3rd, and the next month she hired my friend the Salvadoran woman. I worked there from November
until March. On December 3 of that same year, the Salvadoran woman and I went to ive in a place we rented from a
woman. The place was two blocks from the Migrant House.
Om March 11th I had a very bad experience – some people grabbed me. I knew neither their names nor who they were. I
was coming home from work, about 20 minutes from the room we rented. That day I left work about 7:00 p.m. and at that
hour it was already dark. I lived alone at that time because my friend from El Salvador since February 17 had moved in
with a man from Nicaragua and they lived in another house in Pueblo Nuevo about five blocks from my house. I needed
only to cross the street close to my room when they picked me up. I was going towards my room. I had gone quite a way
and had to stop at the conrner of the street for traffic. There was a dark car stopped on the sidewalk in front of the street
where I was standing, though it was not complety stopped. It seemed that it was going to turn around. I said to myself, “It
is going to pass me by. It is only waiting to let other traffic through.” That was when they grabbed me. Before that, I saw
a man who was in front of a funeral parlor a block before my house. Suddenly, I became aware that he was walking
behind me but thought nothing of it. He was following me. I did not know his intention until after they grabbed me. I got
to the corner of the street and saw a man come out of the dark car, coming towards me, stopping in front of me and then
the man walking from the funeral home grabbed me from behind and put a rag to my mouth and I passed out.
When I woke up I was already in a small room. I had not seen where we had gone. I do not remember what the men who
took me were like, because I paid no attention to them. No one saw them grab me because the street is a lonely street.
The room I was in was very small with a dirt floor. There was only one toilet and a tall small window. There I found a
small hoop that I imagined was from someone who had been there. When I woke up, I called out and asked them where I
was. I believe it was night because it looked like the sun was beginning to rise. I am not sure if it was the same day they
had picked me up or if some days had passed. One of the men came in the morning. His face was covered; they never
allowed anyone to see them. Never did more than one come into the room and their faces were always covered and they
wore gloves.
I say that perhaps it was someone known in the area because they never came with their faces uncovered. I could not
distinguish their voices because they spoke loudly as if angry, in order to intimidate. They had Mexican accents and
always wore dark clothes. That morning I asked the one who came into the room why they had me there and who had
sent them. I told them that I had no friends, why did they have me there. It was then that the man told me that he needed
the number of a family member who lived in the U.S. I told him that I had no family here and that is why I was in Mexicali.
I had been in Mexico for some time because I had no one to help me. In Honduras no one had money because we were
extremely poor and that no one would give him any money. He then told me that if I did not give them a number they
would not release me. He told me I would stay there until I died. My cell pone did not have numbers for family nor did I
have them memorized. They took everything from me and when I remembered, the phone was not working. I told them
to give me my official document and they said no. If I did not give them the number, they would give me nothing back.
All I had had was my cheap telephone, my official document and a few cents. As far as I know, they did not try to contact
any of my contacts on the pone, except a young man named X. He is from Honduras also. One day, after I escaped, I
talked to him at the Salvadoran woman’s house and he told me that someone had called him and had asked if he knew
any of my family. He asked them why. X then demanded to know who they were, they hung up and did not call back. He
says that call was from my pone. When they called him, he first said,”Hey, X.” and asked, “What do you want?” The
caller did answer and said that it was not me, but asked if he knew a number he could give me of one of my family
members. He said no, that he knew nothing. He told them he had known me at the Migrant House but did not know my
family. After that, they hung up. They must have seen that the other numbers on my pone had the Mexicali code; they
did not call anyone else.
That first day that I was in the small room, after the man asked me for phone humbers, he left and left me alone all day. I
no longer heard anyone. About 5:00 p.m., the man returned. That was when they beat me; the only time they beat me.
They continued asking that I give them a number. I knew that it was to ask for money and I did not answer. I put up with
what they were doing to me. From then on, six days since my arrival, they decided to abuse me. I cannot say if it was
only one man who came in to abuse me or if there were two different men. I do not know. I believe that perhaps it was
only the one because he did not act differently. He was neither tall nor very short. I could hear two other persons in the
house, one of a woman who asked to be let out. I yelled out asking who was there but no one answered. I heard talking
when I was in the room with one of the men. When he was speaking to me, I would hear other voices. It seemed that
someone would come into my room and others would enter another room. When I managed to escape, I told the lady
who had helped me and she said she was going to call the police but I do not know if she called, or if anyone else
managed to escape from there.
I was there from March until the beginning of June. When I left I was pregnant. I do not know my daughter’s father. I do
not know if they abused me as a threat so that I could give them telephone numbers or only out of wickedness. I found
out I was pregnant in April when I did not menstruate. I did not say anything to the man out of fear that he would kill me.
Sometimes he would come two or three times a day to abuse me. He had no regular daily routine. One time he did not
come for two days and when he returned he told me that I would die because I did not want to tell them anything. They
gave me nothing to eat those two days. Daily they would give me a roll and a small can of water; there was no fixed time
for them to bring me something to eat. Actually, I did not have an appetite. One month after I was kidnapped, I had lost
hope that I would be set free. I had already made up my mind that I would never leave that place, that I would not be free.
I had a small piece of a blanket to cover up and nothing else. There were no matresses or anything else. I would clean
by taking water from the toilet. I did not have soap. I would wash and put on the same clothes. There were large rocks in
the room because it was falling down. I put some rocks one on top of the other to try to reach a small hole in a window
that faced a small alley. I would sometimes step on the rocks to see if anyone would pass by, but I saw no one. I could
only see parked cars. One day, when I looked out the window a saw a lady passing by. I whistled to get her attention and
she turned but could not see me. I spoke quietly to her and said, “Señora”. She turned and saw me, and she told me to
be quiet that they were there. I thought the lady knew them and I thought she would not help me. A while later I heard
that someone was tapping at the window. I climbed on the rocks again and looked outside and saw that she was coming
with a ladder. She began to break the window with a hammer and a metal piece that looked like a thick nail. She began
to break the window and, on the inside, I asked God that the men would not show up. She gave me the ladder through
that hole.
She would not say anything; she only passed the ladder to me. She must have known that the men were no good and that
they would find out she had helped me. That is why she was asking me to be quiet. I never knew her name. When I
went up the window, I stayed there because I could not manage to get down; it was very high, though the room was just
one level. I was afraid to jump but the lady said she would try to hold on to me. I then slid down like a snake and gave
her my hands and the lady began to pull me until I was out completely. I fell on my stomach. The lady then helped me to
get up. She told me to go on and not to stop. She said that the men only come into the house by the other side. The
house was about the third one but I only saw walls. Everything was desolate. I had escaped about three in the afternoon.
I began to walk not knowing where I was going. I did not know the place having never gone that way. I walked a lot; I
was barefooted because I had left my shoes inside the house. People went by but I did not speak to anyone. When I
would hear a car, I was afraid to turn around. Sometimes I walked, sometimes run, but I continued on. I had forgotten
that I was barefooted. I continued walking until I saw a bus. I walked about 10 minutes to get to the bus. There was a lot
of traffic; taxis went by and I tried to stop them, but since they saw me barefooted and dirty, they did not stop. I got to the
bus and, since passengers were coming out, I asked to get a ride. I asked where the bus was going and he told me that
he was going as far as Cachanilla, a shopping center in downtown Mexicali. Then I told him that I needed a ride to the
Migrant House, that I had no money to pay and he said he would take me there. He went about 8 minutes until he arrived
at Michoacan Street near a school. There I got a sense of where I was, but the bus traveled more. I could not remember
well where we were, but I knew I had been in that area. He let me off at Michoacan, Pueblo Nuevo. He told me to go
straight and I would see the House. I got to the corner of the Migrant House and stayed there because I still felt lost. I
tried to remember where the room was that I had rented. After a half of a block more, I got to the room. I got to my room,
but it was padlocked and I had to ask the owner if she would give me permission to break the lock. I told her I had lost the
key. She is a little old lady and did not ask any questions when I arrived. She only said okay. I stayed in the room all
week without going out. I had escaped on June 15. I did not want to know anything about anyone. I felt dead. I was
afraid. I was used to not telling people what my problems were and that may have been the reason I did not denounce
the men who raped me. But then I remembered my daughters in Honduras and that I had to help them. That is when I left
my room and again went to ask for work at the candy shop. She accepted me once again. She and my friend from El
Salvador asked me why I had disappeared, where had I been. It surprised me that they thought that I had crossed the
border without telling them because they were calling me by telephone and I did not answer. They did not know anything
about me. I only told them that I had been sick. I did not want to tell them what had happened. The Salvadoran woman
had gone to look for me in my room but found it locked. She asked the landlord, and she told her that she had not seen
me. She then went to look for me at the Migrant House and they told her the same and that maybe I had crossed into the
U.S.
My Salvadoran friend thought this was strange because we had talked about it and had agreed that we would cross
together. She wondered why I had not told her I was leaving. Since they thought I had crossed to the U.S., they did not
look for me nor had they told the police. When I returned to work, I was not the same. I used to chat, walk all over, but
now I just went from work to the house. My friend used to ask me what was wrong, that I was no longer the same person,
but I never wanted to tell her anything. All during this time I thought I would have the baby and leave him somewhere. I
did not want to keep it. I never went to a doctor for checkups, nor took vitamins, nothing. I did not want to know anything.
I only thought it would be born and someone else would take care of it. No one knew I was pregnant because I was to
malnourished for such a long time. Neither my family in Honduras nor my family in Houston know what I went through.
They only know that I have a daughter and they believe I know the father, but they do not know the real story.
I stayed in my little room three more months; I left there about August 3. I left because I was afraid to live in it. I was sure
that the men who had kidnapped me knew that I had escaped and if they knew where they had caught me, they would
come looking for me. I did not walk on the same street. I would cross on another street, the roundabout way and walked
more. I preferred to walk more than to cross again where they had picked me up. I would return home during the day.
Sometimes I would leave work at 3:00 and sometimes wait for my friend from El Salvador to leave together and she would
accompany me. With my friend we would leave at 5:00. She would ask me why I would go another way, and I would only
tell her that I liked going that way. She would leave me at the corner of the block and would go on home. She lived about
5 blocks from me. Once I was home I would not leave. I would buy groceries during the day, sometimes with my friend,
but never would I go out in the evening. In reality, I would not spend much for food because I was not hungry. Two
tortillas would do me for a day or only a glass of soda.
At the end of July I asked for refuge in a church. The pastor was Pastor X. He used to give worhip services in the
Migrant House and that is how I got to know hhim. I asked the pastor if he would let me stay in one of the rooms they had
for migrants and he said yes. He asked me why I wanted to go there and I only told him that it was closer to my
workplace. On August 3, I went to live there. It was much better because the church was only one block from where I
worked. I would pay them 300 to 400 pesos monthly. My job at the candy shop was to cover piñatas. The owner paid us
about 30 pesos for each piñata. Sometimes would make 10 piñatas a day. I worked 12 hours a day. I continued working
at the candy shop until December 1.
About November 20 or 22 I suspected a black car with tinted windows was watching me and I was afraid to stay in
Mexicali. I used to see that car a lot. I felt they were the same people who had taken me because what I saw before they
took me was a dark car and for that reason I was afraid. I would see that car at the same corner near the church. I
decided to cross the border from Mexicali to Calexico on December 2. I decided to cross into the U.S. because I had no
other option. Since I was already pregnant, it was going to be difficult to climb aboard the trains and going by bus would
be expensive. I did not make a deal with a “pollero” nor did I ask help from anyone. There were a lot of people near the
border, waiting for the immigration officers to leave. There were about 15 of us. I crossed by myself with a young man
from Oaxaca. When they caught us, I did not know what happened to him. The migra caught us at 6:30 in the afternoon
in the desert on our way to Calexico. It was not even a half hour since we had crossed into the U.S. that they caught us.
They took us to Calexico that same day. We were there only one night. On December 3, they only took me to San Diego
in a van at about 10:00 p.m. They took all the other Mexicans to the border of Calexico. They asked me for papers, but I
had nothing. We got to San Diego about midnight. There they did not give us a uniform or anything. There were 6 of us
women. They showed us where we could bathe; we bathed, and put on the same clothes. Once in San Diego I told them
I was pregnant. I told the official ( a guard), who asked me to fill out some papers, saying that I was pregnant. I asked
her if there were doctors and she told me that the doctors came only when someone was extremely sick and that for
something like a pregnancy no doctor was going to come. She told me I looked fine. I wanted a doctor to examine me
because I felt bad, but I said nothing further. We ate early that day then they sent us to sign some papers and took us
back to the cells. From there they transported us to El Paso, TX. They took us by bus to the San Diego airport. I left San
Diego handcuffed, feet and waist. The same guard whom I had told I was pregnant was the one who handcuffed me. I
told her the left foot was very tight but she did not take it off nor adjust it. On the plane I did not want to say anthing else.
If the lady did not want to adjust it, I thought the guards on the plane would not help me either. My feet were swollen and
my left foot hurt, and I was not aware that it was bleeding until we arrived to El Paso. They gave us water on the plane but
I could not drink it because the cuffs on my hands were tied to my waist and I could not lift my arms enough.
We got to El Paso at dawn on December 4. After leaving the plane, we got into a bus. I told the oficial on the bus that my
left foot was aching. The guard took off my cuffs and everyone elses. I felt he was looking at me. He told me to raise my
foot. When I raised it is when I saw that it was full of blood. When we got to the detention center the guard told the one at
the center that I was the girl with the bloody cuffs. They took me and asked why I had not told the people in San Diego to
take them off. I told them I had told the guard that they were tight but she did not want to take them off. They spoke in
English and I could not understand. They elevated my foot and took a photo. They took a photo of the cuffs and did
nothing else. They gave me some band-aids. We went to bed about 3:00 a.m. and got up at 5:00 for blood samples and
had breakfast at 6:00 a.m. I do not know why they took blood samples because I never got the results. Daily they would
take urine samples. They never told me why there were so many samples taken nor did they give me the results. Once
they took me to a clinic and there they took 6 vials of blood, never told me the results nor explained why. They also
checked my baby to see how it was, and they would tell me that it was okay. They forced me to eat at the center. They
would bring me and three other pregnant women to the cell about 8:00 and give us milk, apples and cookies. At 8:00
P.M. daily we would eat. They would not let us take anything to the cell. We had to eat everything. I forced myself to eat
because I was not hungry. About December 5 an agent called me to his office and asked me if I had family and where. I
told them I had some family in Houston. He asked me for the address but I had none. Then he told me to call them and
ask them to deposit $1500 dollars in an account to pay for my transfer from here to Houston. I called and called and no
one answered. The following Monday the agent asked me if I had called and I told him yes but that no one had answered.
He told me that no one had called him either. He had given me a number for them to contact him. Since I had not heard
from them I could not give them his number.
That same day of our conversation they called me in again. The agent told me to sign some papers and told me I was
leaving that day. I asked him where I was going and he only told me that I was going to a house. I signed the papers and
at 6:00 they called me again and told me to take my things because I was leaving. I had arrived at the detention center on
December 4 a 2:00 a.m. and was there until December 9 when they transferred me to Annunciation House. They did not
receive me there because it was full and they took me to Casa Vides that same day. I arrived about 8:00 P.M. to Casa
Vides. Two Immigration officers brought me. I have been here snce December 9. My daughter was born December 18.