[Vision2020] This is an account of a former co-worker of mine trying to return to work this past weekend Please take a moment to read the account..

[Love America]

Good morning Vision 2020 readers,

Below is a detailed description of an incident involving a co-worker of mine
as he tried to return back to work from a holiday trip home to Austria.  It
is unbelievable that our Customs folks behave in this manner but
unfortunately this is now that case.



For those of you who regularly read V2020 and demand tougher border crossing
procedures, is this really what you want?



Have we as a nation really stooped to this new low?  Unfortunately this is
now the case and while you may think this is just one guy from Austria
trying to return to work in Alaska, his encounter really sheds light on what
America has become, a dying empire resorting to desperate measures to shore
up its crumbling foundations.



BTW,  the person involved in this incident is a 29 year old Christian white
male, with a masters degree, who is internationally known and a  member of
the Austrian Olympic Ski team.  Unfortunately, this incident will cost him
his spot on the ski team as he can no longer travel to the United States to
compete.  He does not have a police record and as a member of this
prestigious team, he is subject to random drug tests and other background
checks.


I must confess that over the last few years I have read Dr. Gier's posts
about Guantanamo Bay with a air of "oh well, they probably deserved it
anyway"  or "this would not happen to the law and order folks of the US or
our allies" or even "they are making this up to discredit the Bush White
House."   Dr. Gier, I must apologize for that view, even though I have not
posted anything on V2020 supporting or debating your position I still
scoffed at what you had written concerning Gitmo.  Maybe I was buying the
old line that this stuff only happens to the guilty; but as my good friend's
experience has shown, upstanding members of society are now common criminals
in the eye of the thugs we use to protect our border.
Chris


Everyone,
I never wrote a big travel update from any of my trips so far. However, the
experience I just made the last five days has caused to change my habit,
because it significantly had changed my point of view on things. I want to
give a statement on what had happened and why I cannot come back for now. It
is for my own peace and reputation, and for you to make your own opinion.

I am finally back at home in Austria. I had my first full night sleep in
five days last night. I am still influenced by what had happened this
weekend.

When I arrived in Seattle and went through customs they had put a red flag
in my file and sent me forward to another officer. After letting me wait for
an hour until I was the last one left I got called in. I did not know what
was going on or what was wrong. I thought it could only be a routine check.
The officer starts asking me for my name and why I would be traveling to the
USA. He walks off and comes back to start yelling at me and accusing me to
enter under false statements. I am brought back into a separate office where
they are telling me that they will send me back to Austria with the next
plane.

I was speechless and could not believe it. Two weeks before I had just put
together a visa application and had to take the train down to Vienna to
speak to the consulate. I explicitly told them I will go to Alaska to set up
my work visa application paid an extra application fee, covered changing my
flight, and paid for my trip to Vienna (8h).

In Seattle at the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) office, officer Foy
keeps walking out of his office to come back and start another round of
yelling at me to not even try to lie because they have all my files and
protocols from what I told the consulate in Vienna. I sit there and think
this cannot be for real. I tell officer Foy why would I, after six years and
entering the US for 12 times, make false statements to risk everything I
have built up during that time. I have worked very hard, got a graduate
degree and a sponsor for my visa. I also keep telling him that I know that
the regulations are very strict and that I had made sure to not make a
mistake by thoroughly preparing my travel documents before I left again. I
tell him I was originally scheduled to come back to Alaska on January
8thbut called up the US embassy to confirm and make sure I am not
breaking any
laws. The visa hotline consultant told me I need to come down to Vienna and
talk to the consul for a visitor visa on January 15. The US consulate's
immigrations attorney confirmed the B1/B2 visa and I was told to enjoy my
travel to the USA.

Nevertheless, officer Foy does not believe me. Instead he walks out again
and comes back to tell me that I have to speak under oath now and if I tell
lies I will be put into a detention facility until they deport me and I will
be forbidden entry into the US for 5-10 years. Again, I am speechless and
can only shake my head. I tell him this can only be a mistake and there has
to be something that can solve this. I have never done anything wrong.

Foy is only a few years older than me and you would think that he would be
reasonable. Not at all, it's like he his brainwashed and he tries to ignore
the true facts that I say. He keeps walking out after every 5-10 minutes to
consult with his supervisor at another office. I remember I have learned
about that at school. He plans next steps, and provokes me by yelling and
accusing me as well as letting me wait again for extended periods of time
over and over, so I get tired, then comes back again and switches to being
nice and polite to gain my trust. The good and bad cop method - funny when
you learn from it at school or watch it on TV at CSI, just weird when you
experience it real world on your own.

All my bags are confiscated and he goes through every piece of paper and
evidence that is in there. He finds notes and other documents that he takes
back to go through and show his supervisor.

This game keeps playing for 4 hours or more. He asks and comes back to the
same questions over and over like he did not ask them yet. Even though I
know that he is forcing me to confess to something I did not do he is also
trying to get me to forget what I have already told him for the same
question before. I am getting really tired and frustrated and make a mistake
by saying I do not know anymore, I am not sure I know the rules anymore. So
he nails me down on why I come to the US again. I cannot believe what I or
anyone else would deserve that for.

I do not know what time it is but it has to be close to ten when Foy walks
out again and finally comes back to tell me that I have been truthful and
told him everything the same as I had told the US embassy in Vienna. I start
wondering why he had put me through this then for four hours over and over
when I had told him everything after half an hour. He basically tried for
four hours to get me to say, confess to something I did not do.

So I ask him what went wrong and he tells me I was misrepresented and
misinformed and I should have not gotten a B1/B2 visa, and that he
apologizes. I ask him if I could call Alaska Airlines to change my flight
which had already left. He tells me that I can voluntarily withdraw my visa
application and that they will send me back home, after all.

I cannot believe it and get really mad but keep myself together. What kind
of justice is this? I have to give finger prints at least three times of all
ten, give data on my parents and friends, bank accounts, things that I own,
phone numbers and addresses of me, family and friends.

I start thinking and all the consequences I will face come to me. I ask him
if he even knows what this means to me, and how much this affects me for my
future. He does not care. It is the protocol, the law. He diminishes by
saying this would not affect any of my future applications for a visa. And
if I would apply for an H1B I would get it and be back in three months. As
some of you know is not like that.

Everybody who has traveled before knows what it really means. My passport is
painted bright red over three pages saying revoked, and visa withdrawn, and
all my personal data, and my files are accessible. Next time I come to the
US a different officer at a different point of entry will see first that I
was denied a visa before and red flags will go up again. And, who can
guarantee me that the next time they will not be suspicious again, and not
believe me again what I have to say for four hours now that my record is not
even clean anymore. There is no justification. I was not my mistake. Being
denied again will close the doors for me forever. But that is not all that I
have to accept.

Around midnight they stick me in a police car and drive off. I do not know
where I will be going. I was not told where I would be brought or what I
have to expect. An officers laughs when I ask him and tells me you will get
some good night sleep, in a nice bed. After about 20 minutes from the
airport we arrive at a detention facility. We drive through two gates.  As
it turns out it is a high security institution with 1200 inmates of
criminals and other illegal immigrants. After stripping down naked in front
of an officer and putting on the inmate uniform I am ordered to lean forward
put my hands on the wall and spread my legs. An officer does a touch-down
exam on every part of my body.

Then I was thrown in a single cell again with a concrete block to sit or
sleep on and the lights on all night to stay up. Every half hour an officer
wakes you up moves you into a different cell or asks you questions again. I
never fall asleep for longer than a few minutes. They bring me to a separate
area and a different cell again. They run medical tests and an x-ray of my
chest until 4 am. When I first came in I was told I would only stay in this
facility for a few hours until the tests are done, and I would be brought
into a dorm room afterwards. However, it never happened and instead they put
me and another guy from Guatemala into the segregation tract/area. It is a
high security area where three officers have to escort us to, and put us in
small cells with iron bunk beds and no mattress. I am very tired and I can
not believe what is happening and why. It all seems like a bad movie but
unfortunately it is not. Around 8am I get handcuffed and escorted out again.
At 10 am they bring me back to the airport where they held me all day to
finally get me on a plane at 6pm.

Sometimes I thought it was not true and only shuck my head, but once I was
put into the detention facility my file was gone and I was an inmate with a
number on a wrist band being treated like a criminal. There was nothing I
could or somebody else could do. It felt like they could do whatever they
wanted to. It did not feel good. It was a very disappointing and humiliating
experience. I have lived in Alaska for 6 years and feel at home there. Now,
I was treated like I am not welcome and should not come back to the US ever
again.

After all, officers that interrogated me laughingly ask me how I liked the
facility and how my "inmate colleagues" have been treating me, and if I have
gotten a "good" rest in there. By that time I could hardly hold back to not
go crazy on them. However, at the end it would only make it worse.

They kept telling me how they would be sorry and apologize. Those ... had
just innocently put me through the worst and ruined my record for traveling
to any country in the close future. How can I accept an apology? My passport
and visa is painted red to show that my visa was revoked and withdrawn. I
was denied entry to the US for a mistake I had not made. I will not be able
to return to the US now even as a tourist in the near future, even that I
had done nothing wrong. Red flags will show up on the computer suspecting me
of entering to attain a work visa. This is similar to any other country that
requires me a visa to enter in the future.

            Around four a clock another senior officer calls me to get on
the phone and talk to Scandinavian airlines. I ask him why, and he replies
that I need to pay fro my ticket back. I tell him that Foy had told me that
I would not need to pay for a ticket since the airline has to take me back
home no matter what. He gives a quick but harsh answer: "Get on the phone or
we will keep you out for five years!" I get up and comply, because I believe
in what he just said.

Right now I am very irritated and mad and am burned out on the idea of
trying again. I have worked hard for a long time to get were I was before
last weekend, and because, as they call it, of a minor bureaucratic error I
had to go through all that, pardon the expression, BS and have to deal with
all the consequences for myself.

I need a few days to reflect and see what I can do to get my record cleaned.
Maybe a lawyer can help. I have also been offered by media in Austria to go
public, but I am not sure and want to wait. I am not all so worried about
myself here to. It concerns just almost more that the US has to use such
means and measures to keep up its organization. Enforcing and spreading such
fear and disgraceful pressure, that nobody ever inside it would experience,
get to know about it unless it hits someone close.

My family and friends here are speechless and do not understand it. My
grandparents are 80 years old and had gone through a lot. They both are old
enough to know what it means to be helplessly exposed to arbitrary judging
authorities of a system. They both got goose bumps and felt set back more
than half a century in time when I told them what happened and could not
believe that this is happening nowadays.

While officer Foy and his colleague escort me through the airport on to the
plane they keep talking to each other. Foy tells how he is jumping on the
immigrations bandwagon to make it up the latter faster. He will try and see
how it goes for a while, but there are a lot of young "speeders" coming up.
The competition is fierce for promotion.

Later, Foy tells me that would I have simply said (lied) I would enter into
the US only for travel they would have not denied my entry and then could
have perfectly switched to a work visa. It is screwed up and after this last
statement it was an even more degrading experience. It seems like you can
not afford to be honest anymore.

I am thankful that I am able to be back at home and that not more had
happened. I have physically not been hurt. The tactics and all procedures
that where performed are certainly an attempt of a psychological breech of
somebody's mind, privacy, and freedom.

I have a very strong desire, goals and a firm character derived from being
brought up in a well functioning family and environment. I am a very strong
person and already have experienced quite a bit in my still short life. This
event will not break my aspirations and energy, but it definitely has
jeopardized the glare of my view on the American ideology of freedom, and
equal and accountable treatment I once had when I first came here. I need to
reflect and get a little distance before I will make a decision to come
back. If you would like to you can tell me what you think or give me advice.
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