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The revelation came from a highway exit sign that unveiled their ultimate location: Alexandria, Louisiana.

They traveled in the back of an government transport – their possessions taken and identification retained by authorities. Rosario and her two American-born children, one of whom is fighting advanced renal cancer, remained unaware about where federal agents were transporting them.

The apprehension

The family unit had been detained at an required meeting near New Orleans on April 24. After being prevented from consulting their attorney, which they would eventually argue in official complaints ignored legal protections, the family was transported 200 miles to this modest settlement in the heart of the region.

"They never told me where I was going," she recounted, responding to questions about her situation for the first time after her family's case became public. "Authorities directed that I must not seek information, I questioned our location, but they remained silent."

The forced departure

Rosario, 25, and her two children were compulsorily transported to Honduras in the pre-dawn period the following day, from a regional airfield in Alexandria that has transformed into a focal point for mass deportation operations. The location houses a distinctive confinement area that has been referred to as a legal "vacuum" by legal representatives with detained individuals, and it opens immediately onto an flight line.

While the confinement area holds exclusively adult male detainees, obtained records indicate at least 3,142 mothers and children have traveled via the Alexandria airport on federal aircraft during the opening period of the present government. Some individuals, like Rosario, are held in secret lodging before being sent abroad or relocated to other detention sites.

Temporary confinement

Rosario could not recall which Alexandria hotel her family was directed toward. "I recall we entered through a garage entrance, not the primary access," she stated.

"We felt like prisoners in a room," Rosario said, explaining: "The children would try to go toward the door, and the women officers would get mad."

Treatment disruptions

The mother's child Romeo was found to have stage 4 kidney cancer at the age of two, which had reached his lungs, and was receiving "regular and critical medical intervention" at a pediatric medical center in New Orleans before his arrest. His sister, Ruby, also a American national, was seven when she was apprehended with her family members.

Rosario "implored" guards at the hotel to grant access to a telephone the night the family was there, she stated in legal filings. She was eventually permitted one short conversation to her father and notified him she was in Alexandria.

The nighttime investigation

The family was woken up at 2 a.m. the following morning, Rosario said, and brought straight to the airport in a transport vehicle with other individuals also held at the hotel.

Without her knowledge, her attorneys and representatives had looked extensively after hours to identify where the two families had been held, in an attempt to obtain legal intervention. But they remained undiscovered. The legal representatives had made repeated requests to immigration authorities right after the detention to prevent removal and find her position. They had been regularly overlooked, according to official records.

"This processing center is itself fundamentally opaque," said an expert, who is handling the case in ongoing litigation. "But in situations involving families, they will typically not transport them to the primary location, but place them in secret lodging close by.

Judicial contentions

At the core of the litigation filed on behalf of Rosario and another family is the allegation that government entities have violated their own regulations governing the treatment of US citizen children with parents under removal proceedings. The directives state that authorities "must provide" parents "a reasonable opportunity" to make decisions regarding the "welfare or movement" of their minor children.

Federal authorities have not yet addressed Rosario's allegations legally. The government agency did not respond to comprehensive queries about the claims.

The airport experience

"Once we got there, it was a mostly deserted facility," Rosario stated. "Only deportation vehicles were arriving."

"There were multiple vans with other mothers and children," she said.

They were kept in the van at the airport for an extended period, seeing other vehicles arrive with men chained at their wrists and ankles.

"That portion was upsetting," she said. "My children kept questioning why everyone was restrained hand and foot ... if they were wrongdoers. I explained it was just normal protocol."

The aircraft boarding

The family was then compelled to board an aircraft, court filings state. At around this period, according to documents, an immigration field office director eventually responded to Rosario's attorney – telling them a stay of removal had been refused. Rosario said she had not agreed ever for her two US citizen children to be sent to another country.

Legal representatives said the date of the detention may not have been accidental. They said the appointment – changed multiple times without reason – may have been timed to coincide with a deportation flight to Honduras the next day.

"Officials apparently channel as many detainees as they can toward that facility so they can populate the aircraft and send them out," commented a representative.

The ongoing impact

The whole situation has led to irreparable harm, according to the legal action. Rosario continues to live with anxiety regarding threats and kidnapping in Honduras.

In a prior announcement, the Department of Homeland Security claimed that Rosario "decided" to bring her children to the required meeting in April, and was asked if she wanted authorities to relocate the minors with someone protected. The organization also stated that Rosario chose to be deported with her children.

Ruby, who was couldn't finish her school year in the US, is at risk of "academic regression" and is "experiencing significant mental health issues", according to the litigation.

Romeo, who has now become five years old, was unable to access vital and necessary medical care in Honduras. He briefly returned to the US, without his mother, to proceed with therapy.

"The child's declining condition and the halt in his therapy have created for the mother substantial worry and emotional turmoil," the court documents state.

*Names of family members have been altered.