By DONNA THORNTON, Editor
Last December, Elder Chavez Carranza was in the middle of his junior year at Asbury High School, with ambitions of being a welder. He was known for making fellow students laugh, for lighting up a room with his smile.
Then came a traffic stop that resulted in 18-year-old Elder being turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Some six months later, he remains in detention, in Winn Correctional Center in Winnfield, Louisiana.
A group of supporters, including United Methodist pastors and church members, friends and teachers from the Etowah County School System — Elder attended Sardis schools before transferring to Asbury just last year — are trying to change that and working to support Elder until they can.
Those supporters say Elder came to the United States legally from Honduras when he was 14 to live with his sister. According to freeelder.net, the teen was granted Special Immigrant Juvenile status in September 2025. SIJ status was created by Congress to “provide humanitarian protection for abused, neglected, or abandoned alien children eligible for long-term foster care,” according to the website, and it entitles the juvenile immigrant to apply for a green card, giving them permanent residency in the U.S.
Supporters say he was in the process of adjusting his immigration status when the traffic stop occurred, and although he showed told officers his legal status and said he had documentation, he was detained. Days later he was sent to the Winn Center.
Pastor Andy Yarnell invited people to a prayer vigil last week, hosted by Mosaic Family and Open Door College Age Ministry in Gadsden, with Elder’s family, friends, and teachers coming together in a livestreamed show of support.
It was not, Yarnell said, a time for protest and politics. Instead, there was prayer, sharing of information about Elder, a coloring station for kids and a letter-writing station for people to send encouragement to him.
Carmen Bahena is an English language learning teacher in the Etowah County School System, working with many students who’ve come to Alabama from other countries, who are navigating more than a new language in many cases. She said EL class becomes a safe space for them. “We’ve become a family,” she said, and Elder was part of that family until last year when he went to Asbury.
She’s been able to keep in touch with him through phone calls, and she updates his friends from Sardis City in a group messaging app.
“Team Elder” meets through Zoom every Monday to provide updates, she said.
In addition to Bahena, Elder’s sister Mayuri Chavez spoke emotionally about her brother. With Bahena’s father as translator, she said she does not know when there will be legal action regarding her brother’s detention.
Yarnell said many of the United Methodist pastors who’ve become involved in the case became aware of Elder through a former detainee, Carlos Della Valle. He was in Winn with Elder and took the teen under his wing, supporters said. Carlos’ wife worked toward and eventually succeeded in getting her husband released, they said, but he’s continued to stay in contact with Elder from his home in Pennsylvania.
Carlos sent a message that was read during the vigil July 7 in Gadsden, and he spoke about the case to reporters Mica Rosenberg and Jeff Ernsthausen for a ProPublica investigative piece about juveniles detained by ICE. Elder’s case is one of several detailed in the news story, which reports of poor conditions at Winn Center.
Bahena said talking to Elder, he smiles and jokes to lighten what she knows are trying conditions for him. That’s just his personality, she said.
Even though Elder was not her student at the time he was taken into ICE custody, Mayuri called her to tell her what had happened last December. The effect was so devastating for Elder’s sister — who had legal custody of her brother since he came to the U.S. — she’d taken any signs of Christmas down, despite having young children, Bahena said, because she couldn’t face it.
Bahena and others from Sardis City stepped in. “I helped them get Christmas gifts for the family,” she said. While she and others try to help and support Elder’s sister and her family, Marshall County school officials are working as well.
Superintendent Cindy Wigley said the school district has written a letter on his behalf, and Student Services social worker Antonia Perez has been following the case.
Freeelder.net suggests contacting Alabama’s contacting senators and representatives about Elder’s case.
To see the vigil from last week, go to the Mosaic Family Gadsden Facebook page. To learn more about Elder’s case, visit freeelder.net.
Elder Chavez Carranza was a student at Asbury High School with dreams of becoming a welder when a traffic stop led to his detention by ICE. He’s now in a Louisiana jail despite claims he was here legally. SPECIAL TO THE LEADER
