Board to reconsider Mexican journalist’s US asylum request

The asylum petition of a Mexican journalist who believes he will be killed if he is deported home will be reconsidered.

The National Press Club says in a statement Thursday that the U.S. Board of Immigration Appeals will reconsider Emilio Gutierrez’s asylum request following its campaign along with other press freedom advocates.

Gutierrez says he began receiving death threats after he wrote articles that alleged military forces were robbing and extorting local people in Chihuahua, which borders New Mexico and part of West Texas.

Now 54, Gutierrez fled north with his teenage son and entered the U.S. in 2008, seeking asylum.

They have been held in a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Sierra Blanca, Texas since the immigration board halted a deportation order earlier this month.