Seeking asylum in the U.S., Part I: THE PROMISE

BY  KAYLEE TORNAY OF THE MAIL TRIBUNE August 12, 2018

Estéban Gonzalez’s life changed when the threats started. Whatever sense he had of childhood innocence narrowed like his breathing room when a group of men surrounded him after he left his school in Lourdes, El Salvador, one day.

The five gang members, young but still several years older than he, began with questions:

“How old are you? Where do you live?”

The 14-year-old is not especially shy with strangers; an enthusiastic evangelist, he would often go door to door to talk about his Christian faith. But he gave these men, whom he knew to be pandilleros, no answers, he says.

He knew what they wanted and that they wouldn’t be satisfied with his tacit refusals to engage.

The gang members insisted that he join them.

Even had Estéban responded, a yes alone would not have convinced them of his commitment.

“To embark on that lifestyle, (you) have to prove it,” he says.

They told him he would have to shoot someone.

And if he refused?

“They told me they would kill me,” he says.

Estéban and his family’s choices from then on became matters of survival. Even today, as Estéban and his 11-year-old sister, Lizet, build a new life over 3,000 miles away in the Rogue Valley, their long-term security remains at risk.

Read the full story at the Mail Tribune here.