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NFL Players Helped Bail Out An Immigrant In ICE Detention
Two NFL players, Josh Norman and Demario Davis, helped bail out an undocumented immigrant on Monday, who had been detained at a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement center since May.
22-year-old Jose Bello is a California farmworker who came to the United States when he was only 3. He read a poem at a Kern County Board of Supervisors meeting a few months ago, criticizing the Trump administration’s treatment of immigrants. Only two days after reading the poem, he was placed into ICE custody on an outstanding DUI charge and ended up being held for three months because he couldn’t pay his $50,000 bail.
Norman, a cornerback for the Washington Washington Football Team, along with Davis, a linebacker for the New Orleans Saints, contributed to Bello’s bail money along with the New York Immigrant Freedom Fund and the National Bail Fund Network, according to reports from The Washington Post.
“To me, it seemed like a dream,” Bello told The Post. “It’s like something that you hear about in movies. I watch football, and I know how much attention and how famous those people are, so just the fact that they would look into helping me out, it was a great honor. I know who they are. I was shocked in a good way.”
According to USA Today, the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California filed a lawsuit alleging that Bello’s First Amendment rights were violated and accused ICE of retaliation over Bello’s poem.
He was first arrested by ICE officers in May of 2018, according to Bakersfield.com. The agency alleged that Bello and his brother had criminal convictions when they were juveniles and were a part of a local gang. A federal immigration judge ordered that Bello be released in August 2018 on $10,000 bail.
In January, Bello was charged with DUI but was not detained. ICE detained him only after he read his viral poem in May on the outstanding DUI charge.
Joshua Norman tweeted about Bello’s release on Tuesday, emphasizing the fact that unfortunately, his situation is not unique.
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