Students from St. Thomas University School of Law in Miami Gardens who spent a week at the Karnes Detention Center in Texas say the experience taught them something law books don't usually spell out.

The group of 12 provided legal help to more than 50 different fathers and sons who'd been separated at the U.S. border. They worked in partnership with Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services, a nonprofit organization inside the detention center that provides free or low-cost legal aid to immigrants.

The St. Thomas Law Karnes Pro Bono Project was the third of its kind, but “this time was different,” according to Lauren Gilbert, professor of law and director of the Immigration Practice Certificate Program at St Thomas.

“I think some of (the students) are really experiencing vicarious trauma from what they saw and experienced,” said Gilbert, who led the trip with social science professor and trauma specialist Judith Bachay.

One student, Florencia Cornu, recalled seeing grown men crying, frustrated with immigration paperwork they didn't understand.

“I still wake up at night thinking about many of these people. Not the cases, but the people that we met,” Cornu said.

As a juris doctor candidate, Cornu said she'd thought she was prepared beforehand.

“Although I knew it's not the same to follow a case in a book, this was people's pain, stories of poverty, of fear of persecution, fathers trying to get a better opportunity for their kids,” she said. “It was very touching.”

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The students arrived July 28, two days after a federal judge's deadline for the reunification of parents and children.

Karnes had moved its female detainees to another center in Dilley, Texas, weeks earlier, which resulted in a “huge influx of fathers and sons who were reunified that week,” according to Gilbert.

“In some cases, we were seeing them just at the point that they were getting to know each other again. It was hard because there was really no time for them to heal or reconnect, and they were having to make these dramatic decisions about what they were going to do,” Gilbert said.

While younger kids held onto their fathers “for dear life,” many of the the older ones, Gilbert said, were angry with them.

“They sort of felt like, 'This is not what I expected when I made this journey,'” he said.

Related story: Florida Attorneys Lend Support to Separated Immigrant Families

Cornu implored fellow South Florida law students and lawyers to make the trip.

“It really puts life in perspective,” she said. “Maybe (the clients) were or they weren't under the scope of the statute or the asylum rules, but all of them were fleeing suffering, fleeing fear and trying to protect their own. What shocked me was most of them were working people, exactly like us, and they were treated as criminals.”

St. Thomas students Alexsandra Simoes, left, Ryan Clough, center, and Florencia Cornu, right. Photo: Professor Lauren Gilbert/ St. Thomas University

The project was led by Immigration Law Students Association at St. Thomas University, its president, Andrea Valencia, and immediate past president, Diego Sanchez.

“Of course, in school we learn the law,” said Alexsandra Simoes, St. Thomas law student and member of ILSA. ”But law doesn't teach you how to be compassionate. In order for us to do justice, we need to have an open mind and an open heart. It can't be just about the Black Letter Law.”

In concert with the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services, the students listened to the clients' stories, helped them understand their legal options and prepare for interviews with immigration officials.

“It wasn't an assembly line,” said law student Donna Nasimov, who also compiled a blog about the trip. “It was trying to figure out what the best option was for everybody.”

Child immigrants. Photo: Ross D. Franklin/AP Photo.

Click here to read the KTU Karnes Project blog

According to Nasimov, practicing immigration law requires “two skins.”

“You have to have the compassionate, understanding personality, but I think you also have to have a tough skin because you are not only retraumatizing these people by having them tell their story, but you are being traumatized in the process because you're living these stories 50 times in a week,” she said.

For Nasimov, seeing immigration statutes play out in real time was a lot to stomach.

“If you have a passion for it, then it's very rewarding. But you also can't be too much of a bleeding heart because you have to think logically and legally,” she said. “Even though their stories are very heartbreaking, they might not all have a legal basis to stay in this country and claim asylum.”

Crossing the U.S. border without official clearance is, after all, illegal.

St. Thomas students Lucas Aisenberg and Donna Nasimov. Photo: Professor Lauren Gilbert/St. Thomas Univeristy.

Nasimov said many of her clients were confused about their rights.

“A lot of these fathers were coerced or told, 'If you sign this paperwork then you can see your son again.' But it turns out they were signing deportation orders, or they were voluntarily waiving any rights to their children,” Nasimov said.

Fellow law student, Cornu, claimed some clients experienced poor conditions at Karnes and other centers.

“I was talking to people who were eating the same food for days and days in other detention centers, who were being given cold soup for their meals for 20, 30 days, and were in despair because they didn't know where their kids were. At the end of the day, they will sign anything to end this,” Cornu said.

A spokesperson from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement called allegations like these “unfair,” and suggested they weren't backed up by “hard facts.”

ICE requested the names, dates of birth and alien registration numbers of the clients so that it could cross-check the information and verify whether complaints were filed. But this was not possible because clients of the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services had signed a nondisclosure agreement.

As for the alleged “cold soup,” ICE public affairs officer Adelina “Nina” Pruneda stated it would be “one-sided” to “simply take the word of these students,” but did not comment further.

'Credible fear'

Student Simoes also recalled working with an indigenous Guatamalan man at Karnes who claimed he'd been persecuted in his home village, where his tribal ethnicity was considered a minority.

Simoes helped him prepare for an upcoming “credible fear interview,” conducted by asylum officers to gauge the legal validity of asylum claims.

“During the interview before the judge, he was so worried about his child, on top of not having an interpreter that spoke his indigenous language,” she said. “His mind was not there, he was just worried about the whereabouts of his child.”

According to Simoes, the barriers to justice in detention centers are considerable.

“I think laws have to be followed, and I'm not saying open the borders and let everybody in. Not at all. But their main treasure is not there with them, which is their child. We can't treat people like this,” she said.

Cornu also remembered the Guatemalan man, who failed his interview.

“He had a good argument for asylum,” she said.

According to their professor, Gilbert, that man's story was far from unusual.

“We saw a lot of those cases where they failed because they just weren't able to focus on what the asylum officer was asking them,” Gilbert said.

But worse than that, Nasimov said, was watching client after client blame themselves for being separated from their children.

“After everything that they went through, these fathers were asking their children for forgiveness,” she said. “Not for bringing them over here or getting mad at them, but to ask a seven-year-old to forgive them for putting those kids in that situation.”