Jermaine Thomas, whose very citizenship was once the subject of a U.S. Supreme Court case a decade ago, was forcibly removed from the United States last week and deported to Jamaica—a nation he had never seen—leaving him unequivocally stateless. Thomas, born on a U.S. Army base in Germany to a U.S. citizen father who served nearly two decades in the military, now faces a desolate future without a recognized nationality.
“I’m looking out the window on the plane, and I’m hoping the plane crashes and I die,” Thomas confided to The Chronicle from a hotel in Kingston, Jamaica, to his despair. He was reportedly shackled at his wrists and ankles during the journey to this unfamiliar land.
According to court documents, Thomas is not a citizen of Germany, where he was born in 1986, nor of the United States, despite his father’s extensive service. He also holds no citizenship in Jamaica, his father’s birth country.
Thomas’s perplexing status stems from his birth abroad to a military parent, a legal grey area that led to his case reaching the nation’s highest court. The complexities of his origins ultimately led to his expulsion from the country he had known mainly, despite his father’s sacrifice.
His harrowing odyssey, he recounted, began with an eviction in Killeen, Texas, a locale approximately an hour north of Austin. To expedite the removal of his belongings, he transferred them to his front yard, accompanied by his rottweiler, Miss Sassy Pants, whose leash was secured to a pole.
Killeen police arrived, reportedly responding to a call about the dog. Thomas claimed he was arrested for suspected trespassing, a misdemeanor, after refusing to identify himself without being told the reason for police presence. Killeen police corroborated his arrest for suspected trespassing, stating no other charges were filed.
Transported to Bell County Jail, Thomas said a court-appointed lawyer advised he could face an eight-month incarceration if he opted for a trial. After approximately 30 days, which led to the termination of his janitorial job, Thomas signed paperwork for conditional release. However, instead of regaining his freedom, he was transferred to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Waco, Texas, then quickly moved to an ICE detention camp in Conroe.
Thomas stated he endured two and a half months of detention in Conroe, grappling with a lack of clarity regarding his case. A deportation officer, he alleged, repeatedly informed him his case was “very unique” and had been escalated to “Washington, D.C.”
“You keep explaining to me that I’m being detained in suspended custody, in detention, but if I don’t have a release day and I don’t get to see a judge, that’s pretty much a life sentence,” Thomas articulated, conveying his profound frustration.
Feeling a palpable lack of progress, Thomas said he contacted the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) to formally report what he perceived as unlawful detention. In his case, he claimed, only grew more convoluted thereafter. A guard informed him of an impending release, providing him with a mesh bag for his personal effects, including paperwork from his citizenship case and a non-functional phone.
Thomas was then escorted to a room populated by Spanish speakers, where he learned from one man that they were all slated for deportation to Nicaragua. “So I get to banging on the door, and I’m like: Hey, why am I in here with them?” Thomas recounted, his voice rising in incredulity. At that moment, Thomas resolved that should officers instruct him to place his hands behind his back, he would steadfastly refuse. “I thought, I’m not gonna do it,” he affirmed. “I’m gonna refuse to do it: Respectfully, I don’t mean to be a problem or anything like that, but you’re not gonna just kidnap me and traffic me across the lands and international lines and deport me like I’ve been seeing y’all do on the news.”
The Back of the Airbus: A Desolate Arrival
Tanya Campbell, a fellow deportee, observed his arrival in Jamaica. While Jamaica was a country Thomas had never physically stepped foot in, and his presence there, as she candidly put it, was due to his “appearance,” at least the prevalent language was English.
Campbell, a Jamaican native, had been incarcerated for manslaughter in New York. Upon her recent release, ICE detained her, and on May 29, she stated she was among approximately 100 individuals transported to a waiting plane on a Miami tarmac, their destination, Kingston.
At the airport, as she disembarked a van and was shackled, Campbell observed Thomas encircled by between eight and 10 officers. He was the last to board the aircraft, a moment she described as resembling “a walk of shame.” He was positioned in the very last row, flanked by officers, which led her to infer that he was a fugitive. Thomas recalled his seat in the 31st row.
The landing itself felt “bizarre, too real,” he said, as “everyone just got up and got off the plane” in what he termed a “stampede.” Thomas remained in the last row, observing. He recounted an ICE officer boarding the plane and audibly stating, “I don’t have records for more than half of these people. There’s something wrong.”
ICE and DHS declined to comment on these specific allegations.
Thomas now faces an uncertain future in Jamaica. He finds local inhabitants difficult to comprehend, particularly those who speak Patois, a dialect unfamiliar to him. He lacks knowledge on how to secure employment. Furthermore, he is unaware whether the Jamaican or U.S. government is subsidizing his hotel accommodations or for how long, and he harbors profound questions concerning the very legality of his presence in the country.
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