"He Has Me Tied with the Blessed and Damned Papers": Undocumented-Immigrant Battered Women in Phoenix, Arizona

Human Organization, Summer 2004 by Salcido, Olivia, Adelman, Madelaine

Sonia illegally crossed the border into the United States, back into Mexico, and returned again to the U.S. seeking safety. In a rather filmic moment the physical border comes to represent the mutually constitutive nature (and danger) of illegality and battering.

I am fearful that they will throw me out, but I can't go back. If I go back, he will kill me. I have tried to investigate if I...can stay and fix my situation. I have looked on the Internet, sought information on flyers because I want to find out if I can stay in this country, something like seeking asylum because my life is at risk.

In fact, Sonia will not qualify for asylum at this time, but she continues to pursue access to safety and economic stability for her and her children. Sebastian, a legal resident, batters Sonia by exploiting her legal vulnerability. Demonstrating the keen power of legal residency, a criminal like Sebastian mobilizes his coyote-based border knowledge together with his legal status to threaten Sonia's life. For undocumented women such as Sonia, the border represents a partial relationship escape route, although as she explains, border crossing does not ensure economic security or safety. In flight from violence and in the pursuit of a living wage, undocumented battered women cross the border. Yet, when they arrive on the other side, they may face the doubled threat of abuse and poverty or illegality and deportation. Increased border control will not reduce the number of women who will attempt to cross the border for safety and security. Instead, with growing awareness of domestic violence on both sides of the border, crossings may rise, become more dangerous, and increase time illegally spent in the U.S. (Hackenberg and Alvarez 2001; Heyman 1999).

The Kindness of Kin Can Kill You

Jazmin, 49 years old and speaking with a heavy northern Mexican accent, explains that after 13 years of marriage, she has been estranged from her husband for 9 years. With the exception of her eldest sons who reside in Mexico, her children are U.S. citizens; her husband, a drug dealer, is a permanent resident. During a five-year period early in the marriage, she lived in the United States with her U.S.-born children but did not obtain LPR before the family returned to Mexico.

When we went back to Mexico, I didn't want to leave, but what could 1 do? He never told me he would kill me, but he always made sure I could see he was armed and besides he told me he would report me to INS anyways.

After living in Mexico for three more years, Jazmin learned more about domestic violence by talking with a neighbor who was a psychologist.

In his many absences [Raphael would leave for months at a time], I started to visit a neighbor whom I had met before at the parties my husband liked to have. He would give me books to read and then we would talk. On one of the many times my husband would leave, he let me know he would not be coming back because he was living with another woman. You know this was not the first time he was with other women, because he was definitely a womanizer. So, I took my son and left and came to the U.S.... It's really strange that it was his brother, out of all the people who here [in the U.S.] helped me by selling me a trailer.