After wrong U-turn, Lulu Martinez ends up in a Texas detention center, facing deportation.
By Ramon Lopez
Original Air Date: June 11, 2025
Host: Lulu Martinez is a recent college graduate—with honors. She was arrested after making a wrong U-turn in North Port and is now at an ICE detention center in Texas. Ramon Lopez reports about a press conference organized by Lulu’s family—and the fallout they got from going public.
Recently graduated from college, with honors: Maria ‘Lulu’ Martinez.
Speaker: Our children do not belong in cages.
Protesters: Our children do not belong in cages.
Speaker: Our children belong in our communities and with us.
Protesters: Our children belong in our communities and with us.
Speaker: Bring Maria back home now.
Protesters: Bring Maria back home now.
Speaker: Say it loud. Say it clear. Immigrants are welcome here.
Protesters: Say it loud. Say it clear. Immigrants are welcome here.
“Bring her home!/Devuélvanla ahora!” event at Trinity Church. Pastor Lillie Brock (l.), Lourdes Martinez (center), Ruth Beltran (r.). Photo: Ramon Lopez
Ramon Lopez: Saturday afternoon, local community activists at the Church of the Trinity on Lockwood Ridge Road had a lot to say about Trump’s harsh immigrant detention and deportation policies.
They were there to support the Martinez family and their 22-year old daughter Maria, or Lulu, a recent honors graduate at a local college. She wasn’t there because Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, has Maria locked up at the El Valle Detention Facility in Raymondville, Texas, where it’s difficult for her family to visit Maria.
Last month, Maria got pulled over by law enforcement for making an illegal U-turn, a minor traffic violation. North Port Police discovered she was driving without a driver’s license and contacted ICE agents because she is undocumented.
The protesters and Martinez family members and friends say it is inhumane and a violation of human rights to separate families. They said Maria should be immediately bonded out of detention and get to plead her case in court. They believe no other immigrant families should be split up and suffer deportation. And they say immigration enforcement officers should be barred from Florida.
Maria’s day in court before an immigration judge in Pompano Beach, Florida, and scheduled for June 26 was cancelled with no explanation. Her so-called Master Hearing will now take place on July 1 in Los Fresnos, Texas, a small town of 8,000 people near Brownsville.
An activist at the Church of the Trinity in support of Maria Martinez. Photo: Lopez
Maria will remain in the Texas detention center until then. Maria’s mother Lourdes is very nervous, as Texas immigration judges are known to be more strict in interpreting immigration law. And she is worried that Maria could be shipped off to Mexico at any time with no advance notice.
Meanwhile, Lourdes Martinez lost her job at a local restaurant because of Saturday’s press conference and Sandro Martinez, Maria’s father, fears the same.
Lourdes Martinez’s plea for mercy for Maria was made in Spanish, and interpreted by Ruth Beltran, a community organizer, with the Tampa Bay Immigrant Solidarity Network. Full disclosure: Beltran hosts WSLR’s “Ruthless Truth” public affairs show on Wednesday nights.
Lourdes Martinez: This is definitely not easy for me, to expose my family like this, but I do this with my love as a mother, which I know many of you will be willing to do for your children and for your family. I know that my daughter is not the only one going through this difficult time. But she is not a criminal. She does not deserve to be there. Please know that these words are not just for myself and for my daughter but for the many families that are going through the same situation. Many of us arrive here full of hope and dreams to be able to give our families a better future. I know that maybe this is not the right way to come into this country, but we all have made mistakes—have made errors in the past. But I believe that we all deserve an opportunity.
RL: Reverend Lillie Brock, pastor of Church of the Trinity, condemned the treatment of immigrants by the Trump Administration.
Lillie Brock: So, let’s be honest. This isn’t about border security. This is about scapegoating, this is about turning fear into policy. and it’s about tearing children away from their parents in our name as Americans. That is not justice. That is not mercy. And, in my view, that is not Christian. I am so sorry that you have not been treated as our neighbors. We care for you. We want to stand with you. So, in the name of all that is holy, bring Maria home.
RL: Lourdes said, through her interpreter, that police officers tricked and mistreated her daughter.
LM: She was mistreated, especially in Sarasota. She was treated with racism. The agents told her that her mother was waiting for her—that her mother was going to pay a bond for her and that she was going to come out, but when she came out, it was actually a trick. They tricked her.
RL: Family friend Cynthia Torres stood up for Lulu.
Cynthia Torres: Everybody has made mistakes here, but we need to find a solution for the families to go, be treated with dignity and respect and find a way for them to—if they have remained here and paid taxes over the years, they also need to have some protection from our government.
He shouldn’t be feeling this way and treated this way like an animal. The treatment of this jail is like how you just catch an animal in the street and put them in jail.
Maria Martinez
RL: Legal fees are a significant burden for those detained, and communication is limited. Ruth Beltran said ICE’s Online Detainee Locator System doesn’t work very well.
Ruth Beltran: Everything we know came from Maria. They don’t provide any information, and it is very difficult to get through. We actually have other families that we are helping where we cannot even find people that are detained by ICE. We cannot even find them on the ICE locator. It’s almost like people disappear, except we know where they are because they call and tell us, “I’m at this facility.”
RL: And Beltran said area law enforcement appears to be stepping up efforts to support the White House, especially in Bradenton. Driver checkpoints there will be the norm for immigration status. She said at least five people have been detained in Bradenton.
This is Ramon Lopez for WSLR News.
WSLR News aims to keep the local community informed with our 1/2 hour local news show, quarterly newspaper and social media feeds. The local news broadcast airs on Wednesdays and Fridays at 6pm.