‘The guards could not speak without yelling’: life as an 85-year-old ICE detainee

The wailing at the Louisiana immigration detention facility began at night, Marie-Thérèse Ross-Mahé remembered, back at home in France. “Children crying, and even babies.” The 85-year-old’s detention last month as part of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown made international headlines. Now, nearly a month after her release , she was ready to talk about it – and the late-in-life love story that had brought her to the US. Ross-Mahé crossed the Atlantic last year to be with her 1950s sweetheart, William B Ross. They had met when he was a US soldier in France and she was a secretary at Nato. “After we both became widowed, we decided to spend holidays together,’’ she said. “Then feelings came back, and we decided to marry.’’ They did so in April 2025, and Ross-Mahé moved in with her husband in Anniston, Alabama . But when Ross died in January, a dispute emerged over his estate. His sons redirected his mail from the Alabama residence, leading Ross-Mahé to miss an immigration-related appointment. Her arrest on 1 April for allegedly overstaying her 90-day visa unfolded so quickly that she barely understood what was happening, she said. Five men, who identified themselves as immigration officers, banged on her door and windows at 8am before handcuffing her and placing her in a vehicle. She was still wearing her bathrobe, slippers and pyjamas. She was transferred two days later to a facility in Basile, Louisiana, where she was held with 58 other women, mostly mothers. …