It’s not a joke: on April 1st, an octogenarian French woman was arrested at her home by the US Immigration Police. The ICE then detained her in a detention center in Louisiana, in the United States.
She returned to France this Friday, announced the French foreign minister. “It’s a source of satisfaction for us,” added Jean-Noël Barrot to the press during a visit to Montpellier. This 85-year-old French woman was married to an American who passed away in January. According to neighbors’ testimonies reported by her son Hervé, interviewed by AFP, she was “arrested, handcuffed hands and feet”.
A love story
The octogenarian had decided to settle in the United States and marry an American, a former Air Force colonel, in 2025. They had met sixty years earlier when she was a bilingual secretary on a NATO base and reconnected after their respective spouses passed away. This Vietnam veteran passed away suddenly in January at the age of 85.
Marie-Thérèse, who hoped for “officialization” of her green card and held a social security card, “awaited the court’s decision on her successions on April 9th” before returning to France “from that judgment”. She had entered the United States in June 2025 with a tourist visa allowing her to stay “90 days” on American soil.
/2026/04/17/69e20f5304875902447949.jpg "French octogenarian placed in detention center in the United States returns to France, Jean")
