After just 18 days in immigration detention, Adelso Bravo heard the guards call his number: 369.“You have a court date,” he said they told him.Inside the Batavia immigration center, a court hearing does not mean freedom. Most often, it means either you’re getting deported or you’re staying put.Bravo, 39, had spent more than two weeks in a crowded unit with other detainees stuck for months and even more than a year. Still, Bravo said he felt hopeful.“I knew my family was fighting for me,” he said.Over the next few days, he would find out how much his wife, advocates and lawyers had done to free him.He had a big advantage: Years spent learning his rights as an advocate for other immigrants, a smart support system and a recent trend in the federal justice system that gives immigrants a chance to make bond.Still, he needed the right judge, a pile of money and a buzzer-beater effort. Friends raised more than $18,000 and collected dozens of support letters from people whose houses he has painted.Three days later, Bravo hugged his wife and three children in Syracuse.“It was more than luck,” he said. “I’m thankful to God for the people I know because they’re the ones who did all the work.” A threat of violenceBravo came to Syracuse more than 20 years ago from Guatemala to be with his extended family and to flee a specific threat of violence. When he was 18 years old, armed men attacked him and his brother-in-law while they were delivering coffee, he said. The men took everything, including the truck, he said.The boss blamed Bravo, who was riding along for the first time. If he ever returns to Guatemala, he said, he will have to pay that debt.“And they don’t pay with money there,” he said.In 2006, Bravo walked across the U.S. border and traveled to Syracuse to be with his parents, who were already there. Because he was only 19, he later joined his father’s asylum case.For many years, Bravo said, he thought he was covered by that family case. But when he married Karen Cisneros, he learned that he had to open his own separate asylum case, he said.In 2023, he said, he started a new case. He said he used the details of that assault in Guatemala as part of his argument that he fears violence in his home country.For two decades, the U.S. government took no interest in Bravo.He started his own painting business and connected with contractors and clients. He filed the required paperwork at the county clerk’s office. He got a tax ID number and paid taxes.It is easy to find the painting business online, along with a phone number.Bravo adopted his wife’s daughter as his own, and they had two children together. Both are U.S. citizens. Angel was born in July.For two decades, Bravo did not hide.But when President Donald Trump started sweeping people with no criminal records into immigration detention centers last year, Bravo said, he changed his habits.Sometimes, he would take his wife’s car to job sites. He started taking different routes.“I thought I was safe because I had a work permit,” he said. “They used to respect that whenever they saw people have work permits.”Still, ICE officers arrested Bravo.On Feb. 10, agents surrounded Bravo’s car near his Syracuse home after he left for work.“They told me to turn the car off, roll the window down and give them the keys,” he said.They took him to an office building in Mattydale, ICE’s local headquarters.He said he drew on his years of experience to stand up for himself. He refused to sign the deportation order they put in front of him. He pushed to call his lawyer before they took his phone away.>>>Read here in Spanish. Leer aquí en Español.The crack in Trump’s strategyIn 2018, Bravo joined the Workers’ Center of Central New York to help other immigrants settle here. He is still on the board and organizes a soccer tournament every year for the group to raise money.The group met in Plymouth Congregational Church and helped new immigrants understand their rights as workers and residents in the U.S. He said he memorized the rights explained in the pamphlets they would hand out. You don’t have to talk, even if ICE agents intimidate you, he said.That work laid the foundation for his release from Batavia.As part of that advocacy, Bravo had already connected with the Volunteer Lawyers Project, a non-profit legal aid group that represents low-income clients on issues like fair housing, debt and immigration.In recent years, VLP lawyers have encouraged their immigrant clients to prepare for the worst. They collect copies of work permits and asylum arguments. They draw up custody papers for children in case their parents are both detained.“We already had Adelso’s information,” VLP Director Sal Curran said.That head start allowed lawyers to act fast to keep him in New York and ask a federal judge to force the immigration court to hold a bond hearing.Across the country, lawyers are taking advantage of a crack in Trump’s aggressive detention strategy. Last July, Trump changed policy to essentially require the mandatory detention of anyone who entered the country without permission at an official port of entry.Previously, the federal government detained and held people without bond only if they were caught at the border as soon as they crossed.Immigration lawyers have challenged that policy change in federal courts by filing hundreds of petitions of habeas corpus, a Constitutional right that forces the government to justify imprisonment.Bravo’s lawyers filed a petition in federal court while he was sitting in a cell in Mattydale, before ICE could ship him to an immigration detention center, Curran said.“We had to get it filed before he got transferred out that afternoon,” Curran said. “You don’t even know if he’s been transferred. You’re just hoping you catch him before he goes.”The same strategy has worked in several high-profile cases in Syracuse in recent weeks. It does not solve anyone’s asylum case, but it allows people to return to freedom while their case plays out. It’s a right guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution, lawyers say.Detainees so far this year are filing habeas petitions about four times a day in the Western District, which covers Batavia, court records show.“Thank God the federal court has been upholding the right to due process,” Curran said.While he waited in Mattydale, Bravo’s lawyers filed an emergency petition against immigration officials.It worked.U.S. District Court Judge Elizabeth Coombe sided with Bravo.She ordered the immigration court to hold a bond hearing within 10 days. The government would have to prove Bravo was a flight risk or a danger to society in order to hold him in custody.Coombe said she would issue a written decision later with detailed reasons for her ruling, according to court records.Waiting, waitingThat afternoon, Bravo arrived in a cell in Batavia, an immigration detention center just off the State Thruway near Buffalo.He was dressed to paint. Guards put him in a crowded cell.“Most of the people that get there are coming from work, so they’re just in their work clothes,” he said. “Sometimes they would joke, ‘Here comes another smelly person.’ ”In Batavia, Bravo said he watched as other immigrants were pushed to speak English and to sign papers they did not understand. There was a constant push to self-deport and even then, there was no guarantee of a quick flight, he said.Other detainees learned that Bravo spoke some English and understood his rights. They came to him for help, he said.One man signed a deportation order and still, he had to fight to be deported. He had been in Batavia for four months.“They told him to wait,” Bravo said. “That’s all they ever tell anyone there, to just wait.” Many people said they had paid lawyers, but they were getting no help, he said.If anyone got out, they were simply moved to other federal detention centers in places like Louisiana or Texas – states where federal judges are less likely to order bond hearings.“I just made up my mind that I would probably have to wait for some time,” Bravo said.Then, the guard called his number. Karen Cisneros and baby Angel watch their father's immigration detention hearing at the Workers' Center of CNY with Jessica Maxwell, center director.Michelle BreidenbachThe judge decidesLast Friday, Karen Cisneros got her two daughters off to fifth grade and kindergarten and brought baby Angel to the Workers’ Center to watch her husband’s bond hearing.She talked to a reporter about how chaotic life has been since Bravo was detained.“I’m alone with my three children,” she said. “We have the support of the community, but it’s still very difficult without Adelso.”He left for work Feb. 10 and stopped answering her phone messages, she said.Then, his father and a lawyer called to say Bravo had been detained.Cisneros found Bravo’s car parked a few blocks from home. A tow truck had a hook in it. She said she paid the man $100 to leave it for her.The children miss their father. They share meals and improvise karate moves together. “My oldest daughter is shedding her baby teeth, and he’s the one who deals with that,” she said. “Right now, she’s waiting for a tooth to fall out. She already knows it’s her dad who does it, but he still leaves her money under the pillow. ”The family also relies on Bravo’s income.“If he is not released soon, I will have to find a job,” she said.Cisneros watched the bond hearing with Jessica Maxwell, a friend and director of the Workers’ Center.Bravo appeared in one square of a Webex screen, alone in a small room, wearing blue prison scrubs. A guard stood outside the door.The judge, his lawyer and the government’s lawyer joined remotely.Maxwell translated the hearing from English to Spanish for Cisneros while Angel pursed his lips together and blew raspberries.No one translated the hearing into Spanish for Bravo.Bravo’s lawyer had submitted 177 pages of testimony to the immigration court to support his release. They included more than 40 letters from customers, contractors and architects. The file included his tax returns.She explained why Bravo is not a flight risk or a danger to society. He has never committed a crime, she said.“I feel like I know the respondent quite well already,” immigration court Judge Brandi Lohr said.The government’s lawyer argued that Bravo is a flight risk because he crossed the border without going through an official port of entry. She pointed out that he did not open an asylum case for 17 years. The judge ordered Bravo to be released on $5,000 bond and an ankle monitor. Cisneros wiped away tears.She put her head on Maxwell’s shoulder.Jessica Maxwell, director of the Workers' Center of Central New York. Scott Schild | sschild@syracuse.com Scott Schild | sschild@syracuse.com‘It just feels opportunistic’Maxwell has fought for dozens and dozens of immigrants detained by ICE in the past year.Bravo is the first person in Maxwell’s orbit to be released on bond.Before Trump, people like Bravo have been allowed to work on farms, in hospitals, as painters and construction workers while the U.S. government considers whether they can become permanent residents.In the past, Maxwell’s advocacy work involved injury cases and seasonal farm worker visas.Since January 2025, however, her work has been constant triage. Immigrants with various permissions – work permits, asylum cases, special status for juveniles – have been detained, often without bond hearings.The Workers’ Center and its subgroup the Syracuse Immigrant and Refugee Defense Network have set up a hotline and trained volunteers to accompany immigrants to appointments. They raise money, hold weekly street rallies and copy documents for vulnerable people.Maxwell said it is hard to know if the federal government went after Bravo because of his advocacy work. “It just feels opportunistic. Whose information do we have and it’s easy for us to go pick up?” she said. “It just seems stupid … What a waste of time and effort.”Maxwell said Bravo should never have been detained. In that time, he would have worked and supported his family.“He’s going to be back where he was, but with all this time and effort,” she said. “Why? What for?”Karen Cisneros with her 7-month old son Angel at the Workers' Center of Central New York. Karen’s husband was detained by ICE in Syracuse. Scott Schild | sschild@syracuse.com Scott Schild | sschild@syracuse.com‘Who are you really catching?’It took a full weekend for Bravo to be released from Batavia.Another contractor picked him up Monday afternoon for the two-hour drive home.Bravo stepped out of the truck, smiling. He was back in his work clothes: Cargo pants sprinkled with paint.The two girls screamed and raced straight into his arms. The three embraced tightly, the oldest daughter wiped away tears while the youngest kept giggling. “Papi is here,” the oldest daughter shouted to others who started to gather.“I’m here, I’m here,” Bravo said. The next day, he talked to syracuse.com about his experience.Bravo was held in a unit with 80 people. Half of them have already signed papers to voluntarily deport, he said. Even then, they have to wait. They lack language skills and legal help. People who are alone with no advocates need access to information that explains their rights, he said.Immigration court is an administrative court under the U.S. Department of Justice. The government does not provide a lawyer like a public defender in federal court.People need to be given hearings, he said.People need to be called by their names instead of numbers, he said.“When they grab people, we just ask that they treat us like human beings,” he said.A reporter asked Bravo if he had ever committed a crime.“Crossing the border,” he said, then started to cry.Bravo pulled up his pant leg to show the ankle monitor he must wear. He does not know what will happen next. He has been given an address to check in on April 1.“When you look at the people they catch, it’s just people coming from work,” he said. “So at the end of the day, who are you really catching?”He planned to take two days to thank people, then return to work.After the interview, Bravo said, he will help his daughter pull her tooth and he will put some money under her pillow.“Today might be the day,” he said.Appeals court rejects Trump’s no-bond immigration detentions, sets stage for Supreme Court reviewICE arrested hundreds with no criminal history in Onondaga County last year, data shows Federal judge orders ICE, border patrol to release records sought by Syracuse groupICE shipped a NY man to Louisiana. A total stranger got him homeICE releases Camden’s Chinese restaurant owner after 9 months