A Venezuelan mother of two who was allegedly trafficked to the US has been unlawfully detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and could soon be deported, according to her lawyers.

The woman has applications in process for asylum and a visa designed for victims of trafficking.

But she was arrested at a routine check-in with the authorities this January and separated from her two children, aged 18 months and four. Meanwhile, her alleged trafficker – who, according to a habeas petition filed in court, allegedly lured her to the US after impregnating her and under the false promises of living “together as a family” – is free.

A crucial hearing in the coming weeks could determine her fate.

The woman’s lawyers allege that her rights to due process have been violated. They have filed a petition of habeas corpus on 11 February, seen by the Guardian, and are calling for her immediate release.

The woman, whose identity the Guardian is withholding for her safety and shall refer to as Flora, a pseudonym, came to the US in 2023 from Colombia but found that when she arrived at the home of the man who had invited her, she was plunged into a nightmare.

The man allegedly “repeatedly raped her, forced her to perform unpaid domestic and commercial labor, and subjected her to severe physical violence, threats, isolation, food deprivation and other forms of abuse”, according to the habeas petition, filed in court in the western district of Louisiana.

Her lawyers allege that her detention violates her rights of due process because, they argue, she is not considered a flight risk, nor a danger to the community, and she was not given an opportunity to be heard before being deprived of liberty.

Caroline Pizano, senior staff attorney at the Human Trafficking Legal Center, an organization in Washington DC that connects trafficking survivors to pro bono attorneys, said her client escaped the home of her alleged trafficker in the midwest last year, after calling the police and a local non-profit then helped her relocate to the east coast.

But, months later, the alleged trafficker traveled to Maryland and found the church where she had taken refuge, Pizano said. The Guardian has reviewed a restraining order granted by Maryland authorities against him and is not naming the alleged perpetrator, for reasons related to the woman’s security..

Pizano alleged that there were “threats of harm to the children” in the midwest and that the accused man – a foreign national – also introduced “an element of debt” into their relationship, which is typical in trafficking cases.

According to the habeas petition, once in the US, he told her that “she owed him money for the journey to the US.” And he demanded “that she have sex with him and work to pay off her debt to him”.

Flora had recently made the decision to report herself as a victim of trafficking to federal authorities. “I was in the process of reporting [the case] when she was detained,” Pizano said in Washington.

That same day, 30 January, Pizano reported the alleged trafficking case to the state department’s Diplomatic Security Service (DSS). She said that on 2 February, the DSS confirmed in writing that the case had been transferred to Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the investigative arm of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

The Guardian asked the DHS several times about the status of any investigation into the alleged trafficker.

The DHS responded via an unnamed spokesperson that: “Homeland Security Investigations received a tip about alleged human trafficking in [name of state withheld by the Guardian]. HSI takes all credible tips of human trafficking seriously and thoroughly investigates each claim. The brave men and women of DHS are the best in the world at going after human and sex traffickers. Under President Trump, we are dismantling sex and human trafficking.”

At the time of publication, the status of Pizano’s report to the authorities and any resulting investigation was unclear.

Flora was initially detained in Maryland at her monthly ICE check-in. After several days in detention at a facility in Baltimore, she was transferred to a correctional facility in Monroe, Louisiana, where she is still being held.

According to her lawyers, Flora has no criminal history.

Meanwhile, the church community in Maryland that took her in for many months, when she was homeless, is praying for her return.

Diane Paulsell, a volunteer who had met Flora and her children many times through the church, had accompanied Flora to two ICE check-ins, including the one that led to her detention in January.

As she waited for Flora that day in a nearby coffee shop, she got a call from a number she did not recognize, she said. Paulsell recalled that it was the ICE office calling, asking her to come pick up Flora’s keys. When she asked about Flora, she recounted that they told her the woman was “on her way to Baltimore.

“So that is when I knew they had taken her,” Paulsell said.

Marty Mellett, another church volunteer, provided her with legal and housing assistance, and helped her open a new bank account when she feared her alleged trafficker might have gotten access to her finances.

During the time Marty spent with Flora, she confided in him that she still feared the man she ran away from. “She’s afraid this guy will come and take her kids,” he said.

Meanwhile, a faith leader, whose name and affiliation are being withheld in order to protect identifying details in the case, who talks to Flora most days by phone and who visited her in detention in Louisiana in February, said that when she saw her there, it was “across a long table” and they were allowed “a three-second hug” at the beginning and end of the visit.

She said that Flora was doing her best to stay “positive” despite the odds.

According to the faith leader, at the facility in Louisiana, Flora was denied the breast pump she needed to extract excess milk after being separated from the younger child she was still nursing. Regarding this allegation, ICE responded that the agency could not comment and referred the Guardian to the ICE national detention standards, which say that all initial health evaluations of female detainees “shall inquire about … if the detainee is currently nursing (breastfeeding)”.

“She needs to be released soon,” the church leader said, adding: “There are wonderful people looking after her children. But they are not their mother.”

Flora is the first client in a trafficking case in the history of the Human Trafficking Legal Center to be detained by ICE. But federal data suggests that under the second Trump administration, she is not alone.

The Immigration Clinic at Georgia State University college of law has produced an analysis of federal habeas petitions, estimating that there have been at least 41 habeas corpus challenges to the detention of alleged trafficking victims since January 2025. That is when Trump took office and his administration rescinded a policy that protected crime and trafficking victims from detention and removal.

Meanwhile, in a class-action lawsuit titled Immigration Center for Women and Children v Noem, referring to Kristi Noem, the outgoing secretary of homeland security, several organizations are challenging the Trump administration about new policies issued in early 2025 that have led to what the lawsuit alleges is the routine detention and deportation of “immigrant survivors” of human trafficking and domestic violence.

In court filings, defendants argued that the class should not be certified and that the plaintiffs lacked standing.

With regard to Flora’s case, the Human Trafficking Legal Center argue that, by detaining her, the Trump administration has violated the “intent and purpose” of the longstanding federal law, known as the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA).

The TVPA, enacted with bipartisan congressional support in 2000, was designed to protect vulnerable victims of trafficking, including non-citizens – irrespective of their immigration status, the center argues.

At the time the TVPA was enacted, Congress itself recognized that “victims are often illegal immigrants in the destination country” in need of protection.

Victims can be key witnesses in criminal investigations into their traffickers. So many say that focusing on a victim’s immigration status distracts from combating crime and preventing criminals from hurting others.

“They are brave and courageous to even come forward. And we should be supporting them as much as we can,” she added.

Pizano said Flora “wants to work with law enforcement” to investigate the man who has harmed her.

“We want them to investigate. This trafficker is dangerous and violent and needs to be in jail, not the victim,” she said.

An unnamed DHS spokesperson responded via email about Flora’s detention.

The statement read: “On January 30, 2026, ICE arrested [name withheld by the Guardian] an illegal alien. She will remain in ICE custody and receive full due process. The T and U visa programs were never intended to be loopholes for illegal aliens seeking to stay in the United States. Congress designed them strictly for the most severe cases – genuine victims of trafficking and crime, and to support law enforcement in bringing perpetrators to justice. Having such protections does not prohibit enforcement action.”

Since then, on 19 March, the government responded to the habeas petition, reiterating its position that Flora’s detention without bond is lawful.