Monica Ryadi, a registered nurse at Main Line Health's Riddle Hospital, faces deportation after ICE agents arrested her at Los Angeles International Airport on Sept. 15.
Ryadi, 30, cares for cardiac patients at the Middletown Township hospital. She was heading to Disneyland with her husband and three-year-old son, both U.S. citizens, when officers approached the family after they stepped off the plane, 6abc first reported.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) held her for about two weeks at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center in California. A court order returned her to her family on Sept. 29, according to PhillyVoice.
She now wears a GPS ankle monitor. It has kept her from performing CPR correctly or standing too close to an MRI machine at work, her attorney Eric Rosenfeld said, according to PhillyVoice.
Ryadi completed her first mandated ICE check-in at the agency's Philadelphia field office on Thursday, Oct. 15, arriving with supporters and the monitor strapped to her leg.
How she got here
Ryadi said her family fled religious persecution in Indonesia and came to the United States in 2005, when she was 9. Federal officials said the family entered legally with permission to stay for six months, according to 6abc.
Her family applied for asylum. In 2010, a judge denied the application but issued what is called a withholding of removal order, according to court documents cited by PhillyVoice. That legal protection prevents deportation to a home country but leaves open the possibility of removal to a third country.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told 6abc that Ryadi "overstayed her welcome" and "was issued a final order of removal by an immigration judge in 2010." Rosenfeld said the removal order "was paused immediately" by the withholding protection.
The two accounts describe the same 2010 ruling differently. DHS frames it as a final removal order. Rosenfeld says the withholding order has protected Ryadi from deportation for more than 15 years.
The arrest
DHS told 6abc that agents were conducting a targeted enforcement operation at LAX when they arrested Ryadi. Rosenfeld said Ryadi believed she was tracked at Philadelphia International Airport before the trip.
Rosenfeld told 6abc that ICE held Ryadi for 15 days and gave her no paperwork. According to Ryadi's habeas corpus petition, as reported by PhillyVoice, officers told her she would "be sent to a third country" without naming a destination.
Local support
U.S. Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon, a Democrat who represents Delaware County, joined supporters outside the Philadelphia ICE office on Oct. 15.
"She's someone who has been here legally," Scanlon told 6abc. "She has committed no crimes, she's paid her taxes, she's served her community as a nurse."
Rosenfeld said Ryadi still faces possible deportation but plans to fight the case in court. Her next steps depend on ICE's response to the withholding order that her legal team says remains in effect.
