WSBTV Atlanta, August 26, reported that Barbadian mother Petra Gooding has one week to stay in Atlanta with her sick child before she’s required to leave the country.
She and seven-year-old-daughter Niamh have been at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta at Egleston for ten months while Niamh undergoes intense chemotherapy for a stage four cancer.
Both are here legally with appropriate insurance, visas, and passports. When Petra applied for an extension on their visitor’s visas, Niamh’s was granted, but Gooding was given a September 2 deadline to leave.
Niamh is too sick to travel, so Gooding can stay in the U.S. illegally, jeopardizing her daughter’s visa, or abandon her. An appeal was denied. A family attorney thinks they might meet requirements for a medical visa, but time is against them.
“She is so sick and for me to have to go back to the plane to come back again even if for two days, it’s heart-wrenching,” Gooding said.
“I can’t even go to the bathroom without her calling out my name to come back by her side because of the pain and how intense it is, so I don’t even want to think what is going to happen.”
While Gooding’s situation speaks to the superior health care available in America (even without ObamaCare) it is doubly egregious considering another situation in nearby Gwinnett County. Also in the Atlanta Metro Area, Gwinnett County Jail houses illegal immigrant Celso Campo-Duartes. Officials have no plans to deport Campo-Duartes in spite of multiple violations after he was released following a conviction for a 2005 hit-and-run resulting in the death of a World War II veteran.
Isaiah proclaimed woe for those who call evil good and good evil. This certainly qualifies on both counts.
Photos.com stock photo, not Petra Gooding and daughter.
