Between a Detention Center and a Home of One's Own

CHICAGO—Immigration detention centers here in northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin are inundated. In three county jails originally for local criminals, nearly 600 undocumented immigrants are locked up, waiting for court hearings that may be as many as three years down the road. They can’t leave—bail for release costs anywhere from $2,000 to $15,000, an amount few have—and following an influx of unaccompanied minors in recent years and the retirements of several local immigration judges, there just aren’t enough people to process all the claims.

And for those who do get released on parole before their hearing, the outside may be in some ways even harsher: Without a work visa or family to help, they have few job prospects and little to fall back on.

This was the fate of one Eritrean woman who arrived in Chicago seeking asylum