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Kenyan Woman Narrates How She Was Detained in the US for over a Year After Traveling to Visit a Friend
A Kenyan woman has narrated how she landed in jail after a friend invited her to visit the US.
In a recent interview with local media, the lady identified only as Grace said she was excited to visit the US as she thought the trip would open the door to greener pastures.
She left the country after obtaining a visitor’s visa from the American Embassy in Nairobi but trouble began shortly after she alighted the plane at an airport in Seattle, Washington.
Grace, a single mother who separated from her husband, says she was unexpectedly interrogated by airport authorities about the friend who invited her to the US.
Unfortunately, she could not answer crucial details about the friend which led officers to believe she was in the country illegally.
“I didn’t have enough details of the person who had invited me to America. On the other hand, the person who invited me didn’t also have my details,” said Grace.
As a result, she was arrested and incarcerated for more than a year before she was eventually deported to Kenya having being denied bond on several occasions.
Grace described spending time behind bars in a foreign country as traumatizing and the fact that she had left her kids back in Kenya exacerbated her suffering.
“Life was not easy for me knowing that I had left my children back in Kenya. Life of being detained is tough because you have no freedom and you are in a foreign country. Other people even committed suicide,” she recounted.
“I would not advise anybody to go and find greener pasture abroad you better live in your country and find something little to do,” she added.