Mid-City church offers sanctuary to Salvadoran man threatened with deportation
 

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When he was 18 years old, Jose Torres fled violence in El Salvador and later arrived in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina and the levee failures. On Nov. 15, he was scheduled to appear for a check-in appointment at the New Orleans office of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), where immigrant advocates say agents planned to hand him a ticket out of the country to ?self-deport.?

But on Nov. 15, Torres ? standing among immigrant advocates and local faith leaders, along with his two U.S.-born daughters, ages 2 and 8 ? announced First Grace United Methodist Church would provide Torres sanctuary.

?I?m tired of being punished over and over, for one reason: for being an immigrant,? Torres said through tears.?