Help Reunite a Young Girl With Her Family

Better Dan

Hello everyone! Please consider adding your name to the petition below. I believe Pearl Jam fans are a force to be reckoned with and we can make a difference. There is more information in the link, but here is an overview: A missionary, Larry Cox, that has dedicated his life to helping others had his adopted daughter, who suffers from epilepsy and other disabilities, taken from him four years ago. She has been in detention by the U.S. government in that time, moved from facility to facility (even facilities that have been accused of sexually abusing detainees). She has not been allowed to contact her family during this time. Her situation has deteriorated and the government offers limited information on her condition. At this point, Larry and his wife, just want to be able to see or communicate with her.

If anyone can make a difference, it is Pearl Jam fans!! I truly believe this! Thank you in advance for your help.

http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/help-keyla.fb52?source=s.icn.fb&r_by=11927651

Better Dan

I had the opportunity to meet Larry and his family a few years ago, and I cannot even begin to imagine the pain he has been going through. The love between him and his daughter was very strong. As I mentioned, she suffers from epilepsy and learning disabilities. Her epilepsy had been under control while she lived with Larry and she had been improving in all areas. Now she is imprisoned, and her condition has deteriorated. To deny her contact with her family for all this time is inhuman!

Here is the latest note that Larry posted to his facebook. Again, please consider adding your name to the petition (it will only take a few seconds) and sharing this to everyone you know. Let's make this go viral! Let's make a difference!

From Larry: "It has been 1,411 days since Keyla was "detained" by our federal government. She has been in our federal government's "custody" for all that time. Despite just about everything Nancy and I can do with the administrative processes with the Department of Health and Human Services and our federal courts, our federal government will not "release" her to us, and she is to remain in our federal government's "custody."
All those words in quotes are words our federal government uses.
Nancy and I say we want Keyla back with us, her family.
We do not think in terms of detention or seizure, maintaining custody, and not releasing Keyla.
She is our daughter. She is part of our family.
Back to those 1,411 days. They are really almost 4 years.
Imagine your own child graduating from high school in May or June of 2011. This May or June could be their graduation from college. Imagine those 4 years without any contact at all, not knowing how your child was.
That is what it has been for us, no contact with a child who was 11 years old when she was "detained" and whose condition has worsened through the lack of control of her seizures, her hospitalization in September of last year for psychiatric treatment for "major depression," and her separation from us, her family.
I believe we now have a unique opportunity to get our message out that we want Keyla back and will welcome her back into our home, no matter her condition.
All of those signatures on the petition below will soon be in the hands of a group of persons having direct access to President Obama. They can hand those signatures and those who comment directly to President Obama.
Please, please sign this petition. Please also comment.
Please ask your friends to sign this petition.
Each signature matters in getting Keyla home.
Thank you, Nancy and larry"

Amongst the Ani

Done and god bless PJ and 10C to help make this happen.

Better Dan

Thank you so much!

Better Dan

There is a facebook group called Bring Keyla Home

A message from the little girl's adopted mother with more information: I ask you that I be allowed to visit Keyla in person at the earliest possible time. I believe I am the best hope for Keyla, and it is in her best interests that I be allowed to see her.
It has now been over 3 years and 8 months since Keyla was taken into custody by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. During that time, we have had no contact with her, and we have received very limited information as to her care. At this time, we aren’t even sure where she is.
Before Keyla was taken into custody, Keyla lived with me and my husband as our child for over 5 years in Matamoros, Mexico. Before that, Keyla’s sole caregiver was her maternal great grandmother, Antonia. At the time we first met Keyla and Antonia, they were living on land that had once been a garbage dump. They had no home of their own and were staying with different friends and extended family members.
We invited Keyla and Antonia to live in the refuge we run in Matamoros. Less than a month before she died in January 2006, Antonia asked me and my husband to take Keyla into our family should anything ever happen to Antonia, and we made Antonia that promise. We have done our best to honor that promise.
Since Antonia’s death, we have been the only family Keyla has ever known. While she lived with us, she called me “Mami” and my husband “Papi” (the Spanish terms for “Mommy” and “Daddy”). We were there for her in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health.
While she lived with us, we saw a remarkable improvement in Keyla. At the time we first met her, Keyla was withdrawn. Keyla has cognitive disabilities. Over time, and with much love, we saw her brighten. She smiled, she sang, she danced, she shined.
Keyla still had her struggles. She has epilepsy, and while we were able to keep her seizures under control, it was a constant requirement to provide her medication and monitor its effectiveness.
Our world changed in 2011. The drug cartels were battling for control of Matamoros, and it was no longer safe for our family to stay. In May 2011, my husband and I came back to the US. We left Keyla in the care of extended family while we tried to make arrangements for her to enter the US. We contacted US Representative Kay Granger, the US Department of State, and the US Department of Homeland Security to arrange Keyla’s entry into the US. We were told that the best way for her to enter would be for us to request humanitarian parole at a Brownsville bridge.
On June 7, 2011, my husband walked Keyla across the Brownsville International Gateway Bridge into the US and requested humanitarian parole for Keyla. That request was immediately denied, and Keyla was designated an Unaccompanied Alien Child and taken into custody by Health and Human Services. We have not seen her since.
Since that day, we have done everything we can think of to reunite our family. My husband and I were named Joint Sole Managing Conservators for Keyla by a Texas court in April 2012, and we filed an Application for Family Reunification with the Office of Refugee Resettlement in May 2012. When our application was denied in May 2013, we turned to the Federal Courts to try and get Keyla back, but both the government and the courts have refused to grant us any legal standing. Since that time, Keyla has been declared a dependent of the state by a Pennsylvania state court.
We continue to work through the legal process, but we are very concerned as to Keyla’s health and welfare. We have limited information, but we believe that since she was taken into custody, Keyla went through government facilities in Texas, Atlanta, Chicago and Philadelphia. We have been told that Keyla was hospitalized in July 2014 to control her seizures. In September 2014, Keyla was moved to the Crittenton Care Provider Program in Fullerton, California. After Keyla was moved to California, we were told that Keyla is being treated for major depression. Her response to treatment was described as poor, primarily due to her intellectual limitations. Her medications for treating depression have the risk of causing seizures.
There is not a waking moment that I am not thinking of Keyla. It tortures me that she is alone somewhere, without any family to care for her. I love her, and I would sacrifice anything for her, as if she were my own flesh and blood. Since I have not seen or heard from her in over 3 years, I assume the worst. I recently dreamed that she had red blotches all over her and she was in pain. I woke up and realized Keyla had never been vaccinated for measles.
No matter what condition she is in, I want to see her. I will travel anywhere in the world at a moments’ notice to be by her side. I want to hold her hand, I want to brush her hair, I want to tell her how much I love her. Please, please, please let me see her!
Keyla’s last memory of my family is on the bridge, when my husband told her she was taking a plane ride for a vacation to Chicago. She stiffened in fear as my husband was forced to leave her with strangers. That evening at the bridge marked 10 days that Keyla had been away from us. She had been staying with her extended family as well as my family, receiving poor treatment in both places. On that day at the bridge, she was elated at the thought of being reunited with us. Instead her elation turned into a level of fear which no child should endure. After this long of a time, I am worried that she has lost hope in ever seeing either of us again. I am sure this has contributed to her depression. If you were a child, when would you lose hope?
I pray that you respond soon. Every day is precious, and I don’t know if I can stand another day without Keyla in my life.