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Texas Bar Foundation Supports Representation of Detained Children in El Paso El Paso, TX- November 5, 2004 Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, a non-profit legal services organization based in El Paso, proudly announces that it has received financial support from the Texas Bar Foundation to provide legal representation and advocacy to unaccompanied minors being held in detention in the El Paso border region. Since June 2004, the number of unaccompanied minors who are detained in the El Paso region has nearly doubled. With the Foundation’s assistance, Las Americas will expand its Justice for Women and Children Project to address the legal needs for the dramatically increased number of detained children in their immigration proceedings. Every year hundreds of unaccompanied children travel to the U.S. to escape abuse, neglect, and persecution in their home countries. Some other children have been sent, willingly or otherwise, to help their families sustain themselves. Once detained at our borders, these children cannot afford legal representation to assist in obtaining release from detention and reunification with family members in the U.S. where possible. Without adequate legal representation, these children remain in detention until their cases are closed, which in some cases can take as long as a year. Las Americas is the only entity providing direct legal services on a continual basis to detained children along the El Paso border area. Since its inception in 1965, the Texas Bar Foundation has awarded more than $6 million in grants to law-related programs. Supported by members of the State Bar of Texas, the Texas Bar Foundation is the nation’s largest charitably-funded bar foundation. Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center is a 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization that provides high quality pro-bono legal representation to indigent immigrants seeking political asylum, unaccompanied minors in detention, and battered immigrant women and their children. |