Annabella Gyasi held at Dulles International Airport for more than a week

Annabella Gyasi has been held for more than a week at dulles international airport after arriving last Tuesday from Ghana on a valid visa with her four-year-old son. The pregnant woman and her child were taken to a windowless detention room while U.S. immigration officials moved to process her for expedited removal.

Gyasi was more than four months pregnant when she arrived, and she was hospitalized twice after reporting vaginal bleeding and lightheadedness. Her lawyers said doctors worried she was not eating enough in detention and was over-stressed, while Gyasi repeatedly told guards that she and her son were hungry.

Gyasi’s son needed care in Ohio

Gyasi and her son had come to the United States so the boy could receive medical care. The child was born with malformed hands, and an appointment at Akron Children’s Hospital in Ohio was scheduled for May 30. The family had made the trip before, in 2024, before returning to Ghana after being told the boy was still too young for surgery.

The detention has now interrupted that medical plan. Gyasi told officials she feared returning to Ghana because of persecution they had both faced, and her lawyers said she was denied additional food before she signed a deportation order and was then provided food.

Judge Leonie Brinkema’s order

A U.S. District Judge, Leonie Brinkema, issued an order that quoted immigration officials as saying Gyasi could not use tourist visas to enter the United States. Immigration officials also said she was being processed for expedited removal because she had admitted under oath that she came to the United States in order to seek asylum.

Sophia Gregg, a senior immigrants’ rights attorney at the ACLU of Virginia, said, “Ms. Gyasi legally traveled to the U.S. to get necessary medical care for her son, but the illegal detention and inhumane treatment that she’s experiencing at Dulles is endangering her son’s health as well as her own”

DHS disputed the allegations

The Department of Homeland Security rejected the accusations, saying, “These allegations are false” and “Everyone in CBP custody, including this individual, has access to appropriate care, including medical evaluation by a doctor, medication, and food”

That leaves the case in the hands of the court process that brought Brinkema’s order into view, while Gyasi remains in airport custody and her family’s medical appointment in Ohio sits outside the detention room.