Additional reporting by Tandy Lau, Report for America corps member
The apparent drowning deaths of two young New York City students—11-year-old Alfa Ousmane Barrie and 13-year-old Garrett Warren—are still under investigation, and still bring many to tears. At the forefront are efforts to bring Alfa’s father to the USA for the child’s burial.
“We are calling on the media to ask Governor Kathy Hochul, Senators Schumer and Gillibrand, and Mayor Eric Adams to put pressure on the State Department to grant the visa waiver quickly to get Alfa Ousmane Barrie’s father Abdoul Barrie to the U.S. for his son’s burial,” Alfa Ousmane Barrie family spokesman Ahmadou Diallo told the Amsterdam News.
Short on conclusive details, the families and the city are still seeking answers.
Barrie went to Democracy Prep in Harlem, and Warren attended the New Explorations into Science, Technology, and Math (NEST+M) in the Lower East Side. The boys went missing on May 12, first near a Harlem fish shop on 145th Street and later thought to have climbed through a gaping hole in the wire fence by the waterfront at 145th Street and 5th Avenue. Reports have ranged from one boy pushing the other, and both falling into the water, to both playing around and falling in the Harlem River.
On Thursday, May 18, 2023, Warren’s body was recovered from the East River. On Saturday morning, May 20, 2023, a body—identified as Barrie—was recovered under the Madison Avenue Bridge over the Hudson River.
While a funeral was held for Warren on Thursday, June 1, Barrie’s father is waiting for word from the U.S. Embassy in Sierra Leone about whether he can come back to the U.S. and attend services for his son.
As Barrie’s family and community are asking for a simple degree of immigration compassionate consideration, the Amsterdam News also reached out to their lawyer, Eric Wuestman, who filed an I-192 waiver on Monday, June 5, after Consul Section, U.S. Embassy, in Freetown, Sierra Leone, denied the initial visa application five days earlier.
“According to the U.S. Embassy in Sierra Leone, they have forwarded the waiver request to the proper authorities, with a request for it to be expedited,” said Diallo.
The Amsterdam News spoke to Barrie family attorney Ezra Glaser, who said last week he was going to “file a notice of claim against the city.”
“We believe that the disrepair of the park is the reason why two kids are now dead,” Glaser said.
He is also filing for discovery, Diallo said.“Now the family is waiting and hoping that Senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, as well both Governor Kathy Hochul and Mayor Eric Adams, would step to the plate and assist in (these efforts).”
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Immigration lawyer Brian Figeroux told the Amsterdam News that the ball is in the court of elected officials to ensure Abdoul Barrie can send off his son.
“Sen. [Chuck] Schumer is the one who should be intervening,” he said. “He gets things done. The pressure should be on him…the Attorney General and his staff are the ones who could make the decisions for those waivers. Senator Schumer could call the Attorney General.”
Figeroux added that typical non-criminal deportations draw a decade-long re-entry ban. Waivers go through the U.S. Attorney General’s Office—while approval rates are high, they’re also lengthy. Barrie has to be buried as soon as possible due to the family’s Islamic beliefs. At worst, an ankle monitor can be used if Abdoul Barrie’s whereabouts are a serious concern. Ultimately, Figeroux said, elected officials need to step up in the face of this tragedy, which he’s still waiting for.
“A form that you fill out is… [just] a process of getting things done,” said Figeroux. “People could move if they wanted to. The mayor and Sen. Schumer, who is from New York, should be the ones that will get this done. If there’s a will, there’s a way, but if you’re Black, it’s different from being white.”
Last Thursday, June 1, seated in front of his son’s casket, crying that he was his only son, Warren’s father, who has not been named in the press, was comforted in the chapel during the wake, surrounded by his sisters and mother. Two men in smart suits, who turned out to be from the Department of Corrections stood close by as a line of mourners hugged the grieving dad, who was handcuffed the whole time. A short time later, escorted by the men, he went back to an unmarked van. The family demanded that no pictures be taken.
Kadiatou Diallo, the now-activist mother of Amadou Diallo, 23, a 1999 police shooting victim, told the Amsterdam News, “My heart goes out to the family of Garrett, because I know how it feels to bury a child.”
She is sad for both families. “Now Alfa’s family needs support for Alfa’s father to be granted a humanitarian visa so that he can be here to bury their son. I appeal to Mayor Eric Adams, and all the senators and Congress representatives of New York to support Alfa’s father’s visa application.”
Legal observers suggested that while Barrie’s waiver is being considered, his supporters should think about filing an I134 affidavit of financial support. A Go-FundMe page raised tens of thousands of dollars for the child’s funeral, and five siblings and mother.
Ahmadou Diallo said that he visited the fence with the gaping hole, that was reportedly where the two children were last seen.
Ahmadou Diallo said Barrie’s family will not bury him until his father is with the family. “Senator Schumer’s office never responded to my email. I don’t know if he got in touch with the State Department or the U.S. Embassy in Sierra Leone. I appeal to the media to help convince Mayor Adams and Senator Schumer and Governor Kathy Hochul to press the State Department to get the U.S. Embassy in Sierra Leone to allow Abdoul Barrie to come to New York to hold services for his son Alfa.”
Tandy Lau is a Report for America corps member and writes about public safety for the Amsterdam News. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep him writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today by visiting https://bit.ly/amnews1.