A detained Catholic sister urges due process after ICE custody in Texas, recounting fear, faith, and legal uncertainty amid deportation efforts.
Newsroom (25/07/2026 Gaudium Press ) On a Sunday morning in late June, as she walked to Mass in McAllen, Texas, Sister Leticia Ugboaja says she was stopped, detained, and left in fear by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents—an experience she now describes as both deeply personal and broadly representative of others living in legal uncertainty.
Nearly a month later, on July 23, Sister Leticia stood before reporters at Our Lady of Sorrows Church, just steps from where the encounter occurred, to deliver a prepared statement. Her message was direct: those targeted in immigration enforcement operations should be given “the chance to be heard.”
The press conference, hosted at the parish along the U.S.-Mexico border, brought together Sister Leticia, her attorney Carlos Moctezuma García, and Sister Norma Pimentel, executive director of Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley. The Diocese of Brownsville later published a full recording of the event.
A Routine Walk Interrupted
Sister Leticia, a member of the Daughters of Mary Mother of Mercy—a Nigerian-founded religious congregation—and a registered nurse with more than a decade of service in local healthcare, described the June 28 incident in vivid terms.
She had been walking to Sunday Mass, meditating on the readings and preparing to serve as an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion, when agents approached her.
“Honestly, in that moment, I did not understand what was going on,” she said. “I was very much afraid, with cold sweat. I could just hear my heart, very tachycardic.”
Her confusion was compounded by familiarity. For more than ten years, she had lived and worked in the McAllen community, caring for patients in area hospitals and walking the same route countless times.
“I did not expect (to be accosted) on an ordinary Sunday morning,” she said. “I have walked here, passed by this same road countless number of times.”
She was detained for several hours and later released following intervention by congressional representatives.
Faith Interrupted
For Sister Leticia, the most painful aspect of the experience was not only the detention itself, but what it prevented.
“As we all know, Sunday Mass is obligatory,” she said. “And for me, not to go to Mass on Sunday, not to receive Communion, it was very, very heartbreaking.”
She said she asked the agents for permission to attend Mass before complying with their orders.
“Even when I told them, ‘Can I go to Mass; can I just attend Mass, can I receive Communion?’ the answer was ‘no.’”
She also described feeling physically vulnerable during the encounter.
“I was just a small woman, a nun,” she said, noting she carried only “my rosary, my key and my phone,” while facing “two men” who were “armed.”
The emotional impact, she added, has lingered. “It is still hurting me up to today.”
Legal Status and Uncertainty
According to her attorney, Sister Leticia’s immigration case reflects a complex legal posture.
In 2019, an immigration judge denied her asylum petition. However, García emphasized that the same ruling granted her protection from removal to Nigeria under the United Nations Convention Against Torture, after determining it was more likely than not she would face torture if returned.
That protection, he said, legally bars deportation to Nigeria. Still, she remains under a final order of removal.
Over recent years, Nigeria has experienced violence affecting both Christians and Muslims, including documented kidnappings of Catholic women religious in 2017 and 2018.
Despite her status, García stressed that Sister Leticia “has done everything the law has asked of her,” maintaining valid work authorization and complying with all immigration requirements.
Her June 28 detention, he said, was tied to an attempt to remove her not to Nigeria but to a third country—an approach currently under litigation in federal courts nationwide.
She is scheduled for a follow-up appointment with immigration officials on July 28. García expressed concern that additional monitoring measures, such as an ankle device, could be imposed.
A Broader Appeal
In her remarks, Sister Leticia repeatedly emphasized that her experience is not isolated.
“I am not the only one,” she said. “There are many others in this same situation—people who have been given some form of protection under our laws, who have followed every rule asked of them, and who still live with uncertainty.”
She framed her decision to speak publicly as rooted in faith.
“My faith teaches me not to be silent,” she said, adding that neither fear nor silence can resolve such issues.
Her appeal focused not on policy specifics but on process and dignity.
“What I am asking is just simple,” she said. “Before anyone is being taken into custody… just give them the chance… so that they can be heard.”
“I believe every person in this situation like me deserves to be heard,” she added, “deserves to be listened to, deserves to be given attention and opportunity.”
- Raju Hasmukh with files from OSV News
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