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It was a highway exit sign that disclosed their ultimate location: Alexandria, Louisiana.

They traveled in the cargo area of an immigration enforcement vehicle – their personal belongings taken and passports held by agents. The mother and her US citizen offspring, including a child who faces advanced renal cancer, had no knowledge about where federal agents were taking them.

The initial encounter

The family unit had been taken into custody at an federal appointment near New Orleans on April 24. After being prevented from consulting their attorney, which they would eventually argue in legal documents breached due process, the family was transported 200 miles to this rural town in the heart of the region.

"They never told me where I was going," the mother explained, providing details about her ordeal for the premier instance after her family's case received coverage. "Authorities directed that I must not seek information, I asked where we were headed, but they offered no answer."

The forced departure

Rosario, 25, and her two children were compulsorily transported to Honduras in the middle of the night the next day, from a regional airfield in Alexandria that has become a center for large-scale removal programs. The site houses a specialized holding facility that has been referred to as a legal "void" by attorneys with detained individuals, and it opens immediately onto an airport tarmac.

While the confinement area holds exclusively adult male detainees, leaked documents indicate at least 3,142 women and children have been processed at the Alexandria airport on immigration transports during the first 100 days of the existing leadership. Certain people, like Rosario, are held in unidentified accommodations before being deported or transferred to other confinement locations.

Hotel detention

The mother didn't remember which Alexandria hotel her family was directed toward. "My recollection is we entered through a vehicle access point, not the primary access," she recalled.

"Our situation resembled captives in accommodation," Rosario said, adding: "The young ones would try to go toward the door, and the women officers would show irritation."

Health issues

The mother's young boy Romeo was identified with metastatic kidney disease at the age of two, which had spread to his lungs, and was receiving "ongoing and essential cancer care" at a specialized children's hospital in New Orleans before his detention by authorities. His sister, Ruby, also a citizen of the United States, was seven when she was detained with her mother and brother.

Rosario "implored" guards at the hotel to allow her to use a telephone the night the family was there, she reported in federal court documents. She was finally allowed one short conversation to her father and informed him she was in Alexandria.

The overnight search

The family was roused at 2 a.m. the subsequent day, Rosario said, and brought straight to the airport in a van with additional detainees also confined in the hotel.

Unbeknownst to the mother, her lawyers and representatives had looked extensively after hours to identify where the two families had been held, in an attempt to obtain legal intervention. But they remained undiscovered. The attorneys had made repeated requests to immigration authorities right after the apprehension to stop the transfer and find her position. They had been regularly overlooked, according to official records.

"The Louisiana location is itself essentially a void," said a legal representative, who is handling the case in ongoing litigation. "Yet with cases involving families, they will frequently avoid bringing to the facility itself, but place them in secret lodging in proximity.

Court claims

At the heart of the legal action filed on behalf of Rosario and other individuals is the assertion that immigration authorities have ignored established rules governing the treatment of US citizen children with parents under removal proceedings. The policies state that authorities "should afford" parents "sufficient time" to make decisions regarding the "wellbeing or relocation" of their underage dependents.

Immigration officials have not yet responded to Rosario's allegations legally. The Department of Homeland Security did not answer comprehensive queries about the allegations.

The airport experience

"Upon reaching the location, it was a largely vacant terminal," Rosario recalled. "Only deportation vehicles were arriving."

"There were multiple vans with more detainees," she said.

They were held in the vehicle at the airport for over four hours, observing other transports come with men chained at their limbs.

"That portion was upsetting," she said. "My children kept inquiring about everyone was restrained hand and foot ... if they were wrongdoers. I said it was just standard procedure."

The aircraft boarding

The family was then forced onto an aircraft, official records state. At roughly then, according to documents, an immigration local official ultimately answered to Rosario's attorney – informing them a removal halt had been rejected. Rosario said she had not agreed ever for her two American-born offspring to be removed to Honduras.

Advocates said the scheduling of the apprehension may not have been coincidental. They said the meeting – changed multiple times without reason – may have been scheduled to align with a transport plane to Honduras the next day.

"Officials apparently channel as many individuals as they can toward that airport so they can occupy the plane and deport them," explained a attorney.

The ongoing impact

The whole situation has resulted in permanent damage, according to the court case. Rosario persistently faces anxiety regarding threats and abduction in Honduras.

In a previously released statement, the federal agency claimed that Rosario "elected" to bring her children to the immigration check-in in April, and was asked if she wanted authorities to place the children with someone protected. The agency also stated that Rosario decided on removal with her children.

Ruby, who was unable to complete her academic term in the US, is at risk of "academic regression" and is "facing substantial psychological challenges", according to the court documents.

Romeo, who has now turned five, was denied specialized and life-saving medical care in Honduras. He temporarily visited the US, without his mother, to proceed with therapy.

"Romeo's deteriorating health and the disruption to his treatment have created for the mother tremendous anxiety and mental suffering," the court documents state.

*Names of individuals have been changed.