The BBC Violent Carters tell that they are now hiding from the American authorities

Her daughter promised a trip to the Disney world in Florida – but what was originally planned as it became a road to escape from “terrorism”.

Gabriella, not her real name, is from Gawayekil, Ecuador, where she led what she called “a normal middle class”: she worked on a 15 -year TV channel, and she had a mortgage and attended her daughter in the private school.

When I read the headlines about the high violence in Ecuador – Gangs fight on cocaine smuggling methodsHigh murders, and prevalent extortion – assumed that the nullity was aimed at “millionaires”.

Then the first threat came: a phone call warns of paying a gang or shooting. The caller knew her workplace and her license plate.

Soon her planned Disney holiday, her daughter’s grandfather was kidnapped.

Her family was asked to pay tens of thousands of dollars and receive videos showing his fingers. He was eventually killed, he left his finger in a bottle as a quiet – A case reported by the BBC.

For fear that Gabriella will not be safe in Ecuador, her partner told her that their daughter would take the trip and not return.

Now, Gabriella is one of the millions in the United States with the suspended asylum claims. Although precise numbers are not available, many Latin American applicants say they have been expelled due to the cardiac violence, which has risen in many countries, including Ecuador.

But immigration law experts say it is difficult for them to give up their cause in the United States.

The American asylum law recognizes five reasons to protect asylum, based on the refugee conference that was formulated after World War II. They are persecution on the basis: race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership of a specific social group.

Citizen and immigration service in the current United States says that asylum “may” only “may be granted to those who flee persecution based on one of these five groups, but the cardiac violence does not fit precisely with any of these groups.

This law is the subject of “many interpretations”, according to Catholine Bush Joseph of the Institute of Immigration Policy.

During the first period of US President Donald Trump in his post, his administration made it difficult for people to seek asylum from gang violence or domestic violence – two categories that appear to be the nominal value on crimes between individuals, but in many countries, it is linked to the systematic issues of justice and corruption.

Trump’s Prosecutor has raised the tape on these allegations, and issued a directive that “the applicant must clarify that the government condones special measures or showed the inability to protect the victims.”

It can be difficult. Gabriella says reporting threats in a country like Ecuador can be risky. “If you are lucky enough and they hold the criminal, it is possible that he will go out the next day and try to kill you in revenge.”

While the Biden administration has canceled this legal interpretation, the law remains unchanged and those who flee the cartals feel oblivious.

Donald Trump also made criminal kartlatt target for his immigration policies – Set some as terrorist organizations and Deporting those who claim to be affiliated with themIn some cases without providing evidence.

Mrs. Bush Joseph says it is too early to know how he will play this in the courts, but he may go “in both directions” for those who flee Cartel’s violence.

Some of them can be classified as “terrorist” victims. But there are fears that those who were forced to pay the nullity can also be accused of providing “material support” to these groups – even if it is forced.

Gabriella agrees with Trump that the Kartel members are “terrorists” and believe that his government must recognize it and others as victims: “I would like to give the president asylum to those who flee violence from these terrorists.”

Mario Russell, Executive Director of the Center for Immigration Studies in the United States, believes that legal definitions should be updated to those who can demand asylum.

He says that at the present time, most victims end up demanding resorting to political foundations, by saying that the cartridges have a lot of social and political power that they behave “as if they were the ruling entity.”

“The problem is that these people suffer from violence and persecution, and persecution means terror. There is fear for their lives.”

Gabriella says she is in an interview with her asylum – which has not yet been granted – plans to seek political asylum. She argues that because of the fact that some police officers and judges in Ecuador are corrupt and have ties with the gangs, she did not feel that she would have protected her from the threats made by the gang members against her in her homeland.

Russell says about 70 % of all asylum claims are already rejected. What has changed under the Trump administration, he says, is the increase in the detention of immigrants who are in the country irregular, but the search for asylum.

The data showed that 60,000 people are now being held while waiting for their issues.

Russell says that he “changes this equation” because they “no longer lived their lives relatively” and they are waiting for a decision on their demands. He adds that the detention “is used” as a way to encourage people to surrender and accept the deportation voluntarily.

President Trump’s latest executive orders expanded deportation and detention authorities in immigration and customs in the United States, including suspending entry to many illegal immigrants.

Mrs. Bush Joseph says the result is an environment in which judges face “tremendous pressure” to deny cases that are not legally sufficient.

She says that direct political cases may be approved quickly, but Cartel cases are difficult and are often rejected in the first review. She adds that these applicants should “fight for protection” while facing some “highest deportation risks.”

For applicants like Gabriella, this means living effectively in closing. “We have been afraid since President Trump took office,” she says.

It has a work permit while the demand for her asylum is great and long -working episodes of manual work in an American factory. “Our life consists of work, home, work, and nothing else. I don’t want to show us another shock.”

She says, “From the strain, the inability to go out, relax, and forget our shocks,” she said, adding that she is afraid to report and arrest her.

It is concerned about following the maximum speed, for fear that any error can justify its deportation or the rejection of its claim. She answers everyone politely, even when she was racist.

Maria shares the concerns of Gabriella, lesbian from the Ecuadorian city of Duran, which has been classified as one of the most violent regions in the world. A gang also tried to blackmail her by sending her threat text messages.

She filed a complaint with the Public Prosecutor’s Office in Ecuador, but a week later, criminals pulled her from her motorcycle, and warned her against payment, and said: “Because you think you are a man, you think something will not happen to you.”

Maria sold the bike and fled to the United States, now working as a dishwasher in New York.

Immigration officials told us about the complaint that I submitted in Ecuador, but a resorting hearing was not scheduled until 2028 and Maria, and this means that she “cannot enjoy life.”

“You must hide, don’t know when a raid may occur,” she explained.

There is an accumulation in the United States of about four million asylum situations pending hearing, and for many such as Maria, the process takes years.

Lewis, the taxi driver who escaped from the United States after the gangs tried to blackmail drivers from his cooperation, is another.

“I have never thought about immigration. But many of my friends were killed,” he says about those who refused to pay.

According to the Immigration Lawyer Spar & BernsteinInstead of helping the cases of people who have fled gangs, the US government appointing some cartals as terrorist groups can actually find some unacceptable applications.

Individuals who pushed smugglers to help them reach the United States, or those who “worked in a city -controlled city and paid protection funds”, can be considered, as they have links to the groups they are trying to escape – and see their asylum claims.

Matthew c. Targhair, a spokesman for American citizenship and immigration services, The American asylum law protects “a very limited number of persecuted foreigners.”

He is also blamed for the two “fraudulent and trivial” claims submitted under the Biden Administration, and says that the new legislation will increase asylum fees to reduce fraud.

He adds: “The suspended asylum demand does not make foreigners immune from enforcement.”

Meanwhile, Americans are divided into the actions of Donald Trump’s immigration. The PEW Research survey of June 60 % has not approved the suspension of most asylum applications; 54 % oppose increased raids. But support is very divided along the party lines.

Most (65 %) support the legal paths of immigrants who are not documented to survive, while 23 % worry that they or someone can be deported.

Gabriella, Maria and Louis insist on those who flee the kartel violence, their understanding. They accept the reason for the deportation of criminals, but they believe that the migrants committed to the law “pay taxes” deserve to stay.

“We want what everyone wants: work, living in a state of law and order, and no longer lives in terror, and not knowing whether you or your child will return home.”