Violence Against Latina Immigrants: Citizenship, Inequality, and Community

2 Violence against Latina Immigrants and Immigration Law

17 l     l 2 Violence against Latina Immigrants and Immigration Law While it is true that anyone can become a victim or a perpetrator of intimate partner violence, gender, sexual identity, race, ethnicity , class, and immigration status influence the way in which violence is inflicted and endured, as well as the resources available to escape and overcome the abusive relationship. The case of Angela poignantly shows the complexities of violence against Latina immigrants, revealing the rationale beneath the legal provisions and community services for battered immigrants through the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) and the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act (VTVPA). Violence against Latina Immigrants: Angela’s Case Sitting down on the edge of the chair and clutching her hands, Angela waited for my questions. Trying to put her at ease, I explained what the intake appointment was about and clarified that we could take it as slow as necessary. She took a deep breath and moved back into the chair. We began: name, address, place and date of birth (her own and those of her husband and her sons). Hesitant to share details about her entry to the United States and her employer’s identity, Angela was relieved when I repeated that everything she told me was confidential; undocumented immigrants, particularly those who have been repeatedly threatened by their batterer, live in fear of being deported and thus are reluctant to trust others, from teachers to doctors, from policemen to nonprofit workers. As I began to inquire about her abusive relationship, Angela’s pain and sadness swamped her nervousness. By the end of the appointment, I knew 18 x Violence against Latina Immigrants that she could be assisted by ORA, but until the lawyer approved her case, I could not say much to her. When I returned from the copy room, Angela was looking at a poster that was hanging on the wall of the office where we had been meeting. She commented, “I didn’t know. I never thought that it was that . . . that it was this . . . violence, domestic violence. But, I guess that was it.” I sat next to her and said, “I know what you mean. It is always very hard to think about one’s experience as such.” Then I told her that the organization that had designed the poster about domestic violence against immigrant women that Angela was referring to offered various services free of charge. Thankful, she left. At our appointment the following week, Angela could not believe that it was true, that she could become a documented immigrant; that she could help her sons become residents of this country; that something “good could actually happen.” For a long time she had believed that she “had ruined it all,” but this news once again gave her “hope.” Battered immigrants, like any survivors of intimate partner violence, are convinced that they are to blame for the abuse; at the same time, their feelings of despondency are intensified because they are unaware of or most probably have been given a distorted version of their rights as undocumented foreigners. But once they find out about having real opportunities to break free from their abusive relationships and rectify their immigration status, most survivors change their perception of possibility: some women break from their past of abuse and dependency; other women reinstate the terms of their intimate relationships from a more leveraged position (only the ones who are still deeply immersed in the abuse continue their lives as they were). Angela followed the first path. Once she realized the nature of her relationship and her rights, she did not look back for a second and relentlessly took all the necessary steps to achieve the end goal: autonomy, nonviolence , and legality for her and her family. She wrote her sworn statement, a detailed history of the abuse, a pivotal part of VAWA self-petitions, about which we had several conversations with the aim of clarifying and expanding parts of it—the goal, ORA’s brochure explains, is to show immigration officers that the applicant is indeed a survivor of violence, and her story, in her “own words” makes “all the difference” in her case. An indispensable piece of the citizenship application process that battered immigrants put together with their advocates, its composition is daunting and painful yet helpful (in regard to the VAWA application itself, as well as the healing process that survivors go through as they think of their relationship as a case of intimate partner...