Close to 200 people marched from Sherbrooke’s Marché de la Gare to Plymouth-Trinity United Church on Saturday afternoon to express their solidarity with the members Rodriguez-Flores family who sought refuge in the church in November of last year and have not left the building since. The walk concluded a week of action meant to highlight the family’s situation and maintain pressure on the federal government to remove the deportation order that would send them back to Mexico and grant them legal status to remain in Canada.
Before leaving the public market, those assembled for the demonstration heard from members of the support committee that helped to organize the event, who shared the context that led the family to take sanctuary in the Church, as well as some of the difficulties they have faced as a result of that decision. Organizers pointed out that the family originally fled their home country after Georgina Flores’ business was torched by a cartel when she refused efforts at extortion and forced recruitment into the local drug trade, and reiterated the fact that the same cartel later attempted to burn their daughter Claudia alive.
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