A young asylum seeker from Venezuela was living in Aurora when he was detained by U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement with his brother, but only he was deported to El Salvador. Community members are outraged, saying he should never have been sent there.
Nixon Perez was deported as part of a secretive operation that has triggered a legal standoff in the U.S. and a debate around the world. Perez, 19, was among the 238 Venezuelan citizens deported on three flights to El Salvador March 15 after being accused of being affiliated with the Tren de Aragua gang.
CBS News obtained an internal government list of people who were on those planes. Perez’s name was on it.
The two brothers, Nixon and Dixon Perez, arrived in Colorado from Venezuela for a better life, according to people close to them. Dixon is now detained by ICE at the Aurora detention center, while Nixon was sent to a maximum security prison in El Salvador.
“We have no idea where he is, or what happened to him or if he’s even still alive,” said V Reeves, a spokesperson for Housekeys Action Network Denver.
Reeves was in tears speaking about the young brothers. They met while working to help relocate residents from the Aspen Grove apartments on Nome Street in Aurora.
“They were some of the most consistent neighbors,” Reeves said. “They were coming to meetings. They were curious about what was going to happen. They were providing child care to parents when they were working. They were definitely well involved and connected.”
Reeves remembers the brothers, specifically Nixon, for his willingness to get involved, and shared a photo of him cleaning up trash around the Aspen Grove community.
But, on July 28, 2024, their story took a turn. Both brothers were charged with two counts of tampering with evidence after cleaning up bullet shells outside of their Aurora apartment following a shooting.
“Which is a very normal thing to want to do, to not have bullet casings in front of your home,” Reeves said. “We were pretty confident that he was going to be able to clear his name, that both of them were.”
According to the Aurora Police Department, the brothers are not listed as members of TdA. It’s unclear how 19-year-old Nixon Perez ended up at the brutal Salvadoran prison.
“And every time I think of face, I just see this really calm, sweet, soft smile, and him telling both me and his mom that it would be OK, that he was going to get out of there because he had done nothing wrong,” Reeves explained.
Friday morning, a federal judge did rule for the return of a Maryland man mistakenly deported to the Salvadoran prison. CBS Colorado will continue to monitor Perez’s situation if that turns out to be his case. We reached out to ice and have not heard back.
