After a week detained in a Vermont facility following her arrest in Manchester, Davona Williams vanished from the state Department of Corrections system Tuesday morning, leaving her lawyers and family unsure of her whereabouts for around 24 hours.
Williams, 42, is originally from Jamaica and has lived in the United States for about 17 years, according to her attorney, Christopher Worth, a visiting assistant professor at the Center for Justice Reform at Vermont Law and Graduate School. Williams was in the midst of a yearslong process to gain legal status and was living in Manchester with her partner and three children, he said.
Wednesday morning, Williams called a family member and told them she had been transferred from the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility to the North Lake Processing Center in Baldwin, Michigan, Worth said.
The federal online system is supposed to notify legal representatives of transfers in immigration cases, but Worth said he was not notified. Williams has yet to appear in the federal ICE detainee locator, which reflects an “imperfect system,” he said.
The Bennington Banner first reported Williams’ move to the Michigan facility.
On the morning of Aug. 25, Williams was pulled over by ICE officials in unmarked cars, who were carrying out a prior order to have Williams deported, which was issued in 2013, Worth said. Williams was given time to call a family member to pick up her 18 month old son who was with her at the time of the arrest before she was transported to Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility in South Burlington, he said.
While she remains in Michigan, Williams’ case is being litigated in the Boston Immigration Court. Since taking on the case last Thursday, Worth said filed an emergency stay so she could remain in the country. After a judge granted the motion, Worth said his next step is to argue against the 2013 order with the goal of having it dropped.
Worth said he did not file a petition to prevent her from being transferred out of state because the most “pressing issue” in a short time frame was to block deportation.
“Davona is staying strong in the face of a challenging legal system that is stacked against her,” Worth said.
Rutland Area NAACP President Mia Schultz said it was scary to learn early Tuesday morning that Williams had disappeared from the system, and that ICE detention has been tough on Williams and her family. But Schultz said the local community has rallied around the family by starting a GoFundMe campaign to help her family pay bills during the immigration proceedings.
“She is beloved by her community,” Schultz said. “We’re trying to ensure the things she built here stay intact.”
