US army veteran who received Purple Heart deported by ICE to Mexico

An army veteran and Purple Heart recipient who served two tours in Iraq was deported on Friday morning from an immigration detention facility in Florence, Arizona.

Arizona state representative Raquel Terán told Fox 10 Phoenix that Jose Barco, a Venezuelan-born veteran whose family fled Cuba as refugees, was deported at 4am from Arizona.

Anna Stout, a volunteer on Barco’s defense team, told Denver 7 his team was not notified of plans for his deportation.

Barco’s family has still not received confirmation of Jose’s current location as of Friday evening. “We have not received word from Jose or from anyone else with firsthand knowledge that he has actually arrived in Nogales [in Mexico]. We only have the official statement from ICE to go on, but no confirmation of Jose’s current location,” his family said in a statement.

“Jose was not able to reach out to his family before any of this initiated,” she told the news outlet, adding that the process has been “frustrating”.

Immigration enforcement told Fox 10 that Barco was deported to Nogales in Mexico.

The court previously ordered for his removal to either Venezuela, Cuba or Mexico.

Barco’s father was a political dissident in Cuba who spoke out against communism, forcing his family to flee to Venezuela in the 1980s. Four years after Barco was born, his family entered the US with asylum, and were later given lawful permanent resident status.

Barco enlisted in the army at 17 and served two tours in Iraq. He was injured by an improvised explosive device during one of his deployments, and received a Purple Heart for his service in combat. He was also awarded a Combat Infantry Badge.

During his military career, Barco had filled out paperwork for citizenship, but his application was never processed for an unknown reason, despite his submitting it. His legal team says his former commander attests to helping him complete and submit the application.

Barco, 39, served 15 years in prison for a felony conviction of attempted murder. In October 2009, Barco was sentenced to 52 years after being convicted of firing a gun at a house party in Colorado Springs. He was suffering from PTSD. One of the bullets he fired hit a 19-year-old woman in the leg.

Barco was released on parole this January after serving 15 years due to good behavior. Upon release, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement detained Barco and took him to a detention center in Colorado.

In September, an immigration judge denied Barco’s relief appeals, which included an application for asylum, and ordered the veteran’s removal from the US without specifying a date.

Stout said the previous few hours had been brutal for Barco’s family and loved ones:

“The fact he is being removed from the country where he was raised and that he fought and bled for is devastating to begin with, but the uncertainty of where he is, not knowing which country they would be deporting him to, and being denied access to him – including for his legal team – has made a horrific situation so much worse.

“Most families know at a minimum where their loved ones will be deported to when they are facing a removal order, but Jose’s family has been kept in the dark about his whereabouts and his destination at every stage of this process.”