果酱视频

Several weeks ago, Megahey received notice that he was to appear at an immigration office for a biometric check-in. New fingerprints. Maybe new photos. Not long after, Morrison received the same notice. Both men were former members of the Irish Republican Army. Both had lived in this country for decades. They shared the same murky immigration status. Deportation proceedings had been stayed in 1997 as part of the Good Friday Peace Accords in Northern Ireland. The accords were engineered by President Bill Clinton.

I remember being at Morrison鈥檚 house in University City on the night the stay was announced. It was a celebratory night, but not quite joyous. The deportation proceedings had been put on indefinite hold. There was no finality to that, but there was a sense that the longer Morrison lived a clean life, the less chance the government would restart its efforts to deport him.

He lived an exemplary life. He became a registered nurse. He specialized in patients with psychiatric problems. He worked for the state of Missouri for almost 20 years. He was a supervisor at the State Hospital on Arsenal Street. He worked at Hawthorne Children鈥檚 Psychiatric Hospital. He was a guest lecturer at the 果酱视频 County Police Academy. He talked about nonviolent ways to handle people with mental problems.

Still, there were check-ins. He needed to renew his permit to work. He needed special permission to travel. The road was never smooth.

Then came the 2024 elections. Deportations became an obsession with the new administration. The White House wanted 3,000 a day.

So when Morrison got his notice for a biometric check-in, he worried. Might he be grabbed by ICE at the check-in? He is 69. He has had two serious strokes. He uses a cane. He takes medications. He did not think he could survive long in a detention center. Plus, the Supreme Court has ruled that our government can send deportees anywhere. Morrison could find himself in Sudan or El Salvador or Rwanda.

Megahey, who is 82, went first. If he was detained, his wife was supposed to call Morrison immediately, and Morrison would then try to make his way to Ireland. Megahey himself called. No problems, he said. Morrison, nervously, went downtown for his appointment. No problems.

Then Megahey got another notification from Homeland Security.

鈥淚t is time for you to leave the United States,鈥� it began. 鈥淚f you do not depart the United States immediately you will be subject to potential law enforcement actions that will result in your removal from the United States 鈥︹��

Morrison called his immigration attorney in New York.

Get out while you can, she said. They鈥檙e coming.

Morrison grew up in Derry in Northern Ireland. He joined the IRA in 1972 when he was 16. He was 19 when he was arrested for attempting to shoot a Royal Ulster Constabulary. The pistol jammed. Morrison was sent to Long Kesh prison in Belfast.

While he was in prison, Francie Broderick of 果酱视频, who believed in the cause, saw a list of IRA prisoners in a magazine and decided to write to one. She sent a letter to Willie Doherty.

Doherty was not a letter-writer and gave the letter to Morrison. Soon Morrison and Broderick were pen pals, and then more. Broderick visited the prison. When Morrison was released in 1985, he came to 果酱视频.

He overstayed his visa. He and Broderick were married. He lived underground. He worked cash jobs. Without a Social Security number, he used his phone number on his tax forms. The IRS responded that you can鈥檛 use a phone number for tax purposes and issued him a tax identification number.

A daughter, Kate, was born in 1988, a son, Matthew, in 1991. Somebody who knew somebody who knew somebody suggested that Morrison should apply for legal residency. He went to the immigration office, applied for residency, and the government began deportation proceedings, which chugged along at a glacial pace.

Then came the Good Friday Peace Accords and the deportation was stayed. Life went on. Morrison became a grandfather. He and Broderick divorced and Morrison married Sandi Swift. She is active in the Hibernians. She and Morrison lived with her 92-year-old mother in St. Charles.

Morrison and Swift pondered the advice of his attorney. What would a move to Ireland or Northern Ireland mean? As a non-citizen, Morrison would lose the Social Security benefits he had earned. Swift would retain hers. But what about her 92-yer-old mother? And what about their children and grandchildren? None of these people is wealthy. Visits would be rare.

Morrison also wondered what it would be like to parachute back into Derry after 50 years. The city has changed. You can stand on the hill at Long Tower Church where Morrison served as an altar boy with Raymond McCartney, who later became a hunger striker at Long Kesh, and look down at the Bogside neighborhood and you wouldn鈥檛 recognize it. It was once a maze of a place where 鈥淭he Boys,鈥� as they were called, ran through its narrow alleys and tossed their Armalite rifles into certain yards where the women would quickly pick them up and hide them in places the Brits could never find. Those narrow streets and alleys are gone. Urban renewal.

Morrison wondered how he would be accepted. Some people surely want to forget those times. Others just as surely cannot.

But misgivings and doubts aside, there was no choice. He had to leave.

Pete Gallagher, perhaps his best friend, organized a farewell dinner in a private room at Bartolino鈥檚 on Hampton Avenue. There were 15 of us. A smattering of Morrison鈥檚 friends from 40 years in 果酱视频. The only dignitary was Comptroller Donna Baringer, and she was there not as an elected official but as a Lady Hibernian. There were a few toasts, and some singing. Nancy Bulte sang, 鈥淚鈥檓 So Glad We Had This Time Together,鈥� and Maryjo Gallagher sang, 鈥淭he Parting Glass.鈥�

A couple of days later, Matt left.

He is settling into his new old life. He has been welcomed back by family and friends. Among those friends is Willie Doherty, who got the letter that changed Morrison鈥檚 life. Swift plans to split her time between St. Charles and Derry. Morrison is still figuring out the details. Health care is not a concern he told me. The national heath insurance in Northern Ireland is good. Perhaps he can get on disability.

鈥淚 think what I鈥檒l miss the most is spending timer with Aidan,鈥� he said. Aidan is his 11-year-old grandson. He鈥檚 too young to understand why this will be a better country without his grandfather. I鈥檓 no help there. I don鈥檛 understand it myself.