Two undocumented Americans are spending a lot of time in courtas attorneys, not defendants
On the morning that Alfonso Maldonado Silva was set to argue his first case before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Pasadena, Ca., he was too nervous to even drink a glass of juice for breakfast.
So he decided to head to court early to review the case one last time. He said a short prayer asking for wisdom, then he showered, dressed in a neatly pressed gray suit, and on an overcast morning last April, headed out the door with his evidence binder in hand. He had been up since 5 a.m.
Maldonado, a third-year law student at Western State College of Law in Orange County, had left nothing to chance. This would be his first time arguing a case in court before any judge. So he had arrived the night before to stay in a Pasadena hotel to avoid the clogged commute from his Corona apartment during rush-hour.
The only thing on the 28-year-olds mind was the law.
Much was riding on this case. Maldonado and his fellow law student, Cristel Martinez Medina, were representing an undocumented Salvadoran immigrant, Juan Carlos Beltran, whose ability to stay in the United States to fight his deportation order depended on todays argument before the federal appeals court.
https://thinkprogress.org/the-unlikely-story-of-the-undocumented-attorneys-fighting-for-the-lives-of-their-undocumented-clients-07209cb95282/