Francisco Borges is missing a tooth.

“I was beaten many times. Armed police,” he said, pointing to the gap on the left side of his mouth. “Those were not fun times.”

Seated at the kitchen table in his tiny, two-bedroom apartment in East Lawrence, Borges wants to explain what happened, but he’s worried. He doesn’t want his American friends to think he did he did anything wrong.

“Here, in America, it is hard to understand. The people have not seen it with their eyes,” he said, struggling to find the right words. “But where I come from, if you are a male and over 18 years old and you are not in uniform, the police can stop you. They can do anything they want to you. They can beat you. They can put you in jail because if you are a young male and you are not in the army, then you are a criminal.”

He paused. “I did nothing wrong.”

Now in the United States, the 31-year-old Angolan is facing a different kind of danger. And again, he said, he has done nothing wrong.

Borges’ American dream turned into a nightmare last month when he went to renew his work permit at the U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Kansas City, Mo.

Immigration officials detained Borges after a records check revealed his application for asylum had been denied. A subsequent appeal also had been denied.

“They said they sent me letters, telling me this,” Borges said. “But I never got them. I didn’t know.”

After spending a night in jail, he was released after agreeing to wear an electronic tracking device on his ankle. He also has to report in person to an immigration office in Kansas City, Mo., three times a week.

“I feel like I am a criminal, but I have committed no crime,” he said.

Francisco Borges, right, wears an ankle bracelet so that the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement can keep tabs on him. Borges fled Angola four years ago and made his way to the U.S. He faces deportation, despite being married to U.S. citizen and Lawrence resident Whitney Taylor-Borges, with whom he has a daughter, Joliauna Raine Taylor-Borges.

Borges, 31, is from Luanda, Angola. He was there in 1991 when the collapse of the Soviet Union triggered fierce fighting between the long-feuding rebel groups, Popular Movement for Liberation of Angola (MPLA) and National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA). In eight months alone, 182,000 people died, according to the Center for the Prevention of Genocide’s Web site.

‘Saw many friends killed’

“It was very dangerous,” he said. “I was in the army twice, UNITA. But it is not like being in the army here. Nobody knew why they were fighting; all you know was that if you didn’t kill the other person, he was going to kill you and that when it was over, somebody was going to be rich and powerful.”

Both sides, he said, suffered mass defections.

“My friend and I, we buried people killed in the streets,” he said. “I saw many friends killed.”

Borges, then 19, fled Angola in 1993, stowing away on a ship bound for Brazil.

“I had a friend who let me on,” he said. “I hid among the containers.”

Borges spent two years in Brazil, moving from job to job. Over the next five years, he migrated north, spending weeks, months or years in Venezuela, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, Belize and Mexico.

“When you have nothing and when you are hungry, you work — you go where there is work,” Borges explained.

American journey

He arrived in the United States — Brownsville, Texas — in January 2000. After looking for work in Atlanta and New York, he heard from a friend in Lawrence.

“He said it was a very nice place,” Borges recalled. He arrived in April 2000 and applied for political asylum.

He got married. Borges and his wife, Whitney, 22, have a 3-month-old daughter, Joliauna.

He works the late shift at Amarr Garage Door in Lawrence. He’s taking a remedial writing class at the Adult Learning Center at Lawrence High School.

“I want to get my GED,” he said, noting he completed two years of classes at the University of Luanda.

But since his run-in with immigration officials, Borges has become a prisoner in his home. He’s not to leave his apartment from 1 p.m. to 11 p.m. — from when he finishes class to when he has to be at work.

Suzanne Gladney, managing attorney at the Legal Aid Office of Western Missouri office in Kansas City, said Borges is lucky to be out of jail.

“He’ll only have the bracelet (tracking device) on for a few more weeks,” she said. “And then, eventually, he won’t have to report in as often, he’ll be able to call in.”

Worst-case scenario

If Borges were Mexican, chances are he’d still be in jail awaiting deportation, Gladney said.

“If you’re an undocumented Mexican with no family here, you either put up a $5,000 bond — that’s cash for the full amount, no bondsman — or you go straight to deportation,” she said.

Though Borges was referred to the Legal Aid Office, Gladney explained that immigration cases are considered civil rather than criminal. Consequently, Borges is not entitled to legal representation.

Gladney’s office referred Borges to Angela Ferguson, an immigration attorney in Kansas City, Kan. He is to meet with her Thursday.

“These are not easy cases,” Ferguson said, noting that for Borges to fend off deportation, he will have to prove a “reasonable belief” that if he’s returned to Angola, he will be persecuted because of his race, nationality, religion, political opinion or membership in a social group.

The fact that Borges is married to an American woman and has an American daughter doesn’t matter, she said.

“Because he married after he applied for asylum, it’s considered a marriage of convenience,” said Ferguson, a 1986 graduate of Kansas University School of Law.

Waiting game

Immigration statistics, she said, show that about 30 percent of the asylum requests filed by Angolans are upheld; 70 percent are rejected.

“There are a lot of factors to sort through,” she said. “It’s a complicated process.”

Because immigration dockets are full, it’s unlikely a judge will rule on Borges’ deportation for at least a year.

“Kansas and Missouri are in a region that’s based in Chicago,” Ferguson said. “There are three judges. Two of them hold hearings by tele-video — they stay in Chicago. The third judge comes here.”

Of the judges’ three dockets, one is filled into 2006 and two are “booked into late 2005,” Ferguson said. “The system is backlogged like you wouldn’t believe.”

Borges said he doubted he would be persecuted if he’s returned to Angola. But he doesn’t want to go back, he said, because even though the civil war ended in 2002 it’s still not safe.

“My mother still lives there,” he said. “She doesn’t want me to come. There are land mines everywhere. It is very dangerous.”

The issue

But in deportation cases, the issue isn’t safety, Gladney said. It’s persecution.

“Central Americans are regularly turned down even though their countries are in chaos,” Gladney said. “That chaos may mean everybody’s life is in danger, but if you’re not going to be singled because of who you are or what you believe, it doesn’t count. Your situation is seen as being no worse than anyone else’s and under the law, you’re not entitled to political asylum.”

If Borges is deported, Whitney Borges said she would follow her husband, even if it means moving to Angola.

“I grew up without a dad,” she said. “I don’t want my daughter growing up without a dad.”

But she can’t help thinking that what’s happening to her husband is un-American, she said.

“I just don’t understand why they’re going after him when he hasn’t done anything wrong,” she said. “We’ve got all these people coming into the country, working illegally. But he’s always had a work permit, he’s always done what he’s been asked to do.”

Francisco Borges’ plight is not unique.

Many sad stories

“There are many, many people with sad stories,” said Carl Rusnok, a Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman. “But if he’s been before two judges and if he’s been twice denied, well, I can only assume that he was denied for good reason. He’s had his day in court.”

Rusnok said he was not familiar with Borges’ case.

To some, deporting someone in Borges’ situation may appear harsh. But U.S. immigration policies are fair and just, Rusnok insisted.

“We have a very legitimate process,” he said. “I know of no other country in the world with immigration policies that are more liberal than ours.”

At some point in the process, Rusnok said, it’s likely Borges will be given the option of “voluntary departure,” meaning he’d be allowed to go to whatever country would take him.