An attorney for the family of a Chicago teen who died Friday said an immigration judge’s ruling in her father’s deportation case came just days before the teenager’s death, underscoring the pressure families described as intensifying during detention and legal proceedings.
Ofelia Giselle Torres Hidalgo, 16, died Friday after battling stage 4 alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma, the family said in a statement. The statement said funeral arrangements would remain private. Her family said she had been diagnosed in December 2024 with the aggressive soft-tissue cancer and had undergone chemotherapy and radiation.
Torres Hidalgo had drawn public attention earlier while her father’s immigration case moved through the courts. According to the family statement, she spoke out for her father’s release after Ruben Torres Maldonado was detained last fall by immigration officials in suburban Chicago, during an operation described as “Operation Midway Blitz.”
Kalman Resnick, the attorney representing Torres Maldonado, said in a statement that he and the family mourned Ofelia’s passing and hoped she would serve as a model for others facing similar circumstances. Resnick said Ofelia was “heroic and brave in the face of ICE’s detention and threatened deportation of her father,” and he added: “We mourn Ofelia’s passing, and we hope that she will serve as a model for us all for how to be courageous and to fight for what’s right to our last breaths.”
Resnick said an immigration judge in Chicago issued a ruling three days before Ofelia’s death finding that Torres Maldonado was conditionally entitled to receive “cancellation of removal.” The family statement said the relief would be based on the hardships his deportation would cause the children, who were described as being born in the United States and U.S. citizens.
The case history described in the family account traces back to Torres Maldonado’s detention on Oct. 18. The statement said he was detained at a Home Depot store in suburban Chicago as the crackdown known as “Operation Midway Blitz” began in early September. The statement also said Torres Hidalgo attended a hearing in October via Zoom and was present during proceedings that followed her father’s detention.
Torres Hidalgo’s family described her health care disruption during the detention period. The family said her attorneys told a judge at that time that she had been released from the hospital just a day before her father’s arrest so she could see family and friends, and that she had been unable to continue treatment “because of the stress and disruption,” according to the statement.
The family statement also described a bond dispute over Torres Maldonado’s detention. It said that as his deportation case proceeded, his lawyers petitioned for his release, and a judge ordered a bond hearing after ruling in October that his detention was illegal and violated Torres Maldonado’s due process rights. The statement said a later judge cited Torres Maldonado’s lack of a criminal history in allowing his release on a $2,000 bond.
The family account said Torres Maldonado entered the United States in 2003. It said he and his partner, Sandibell Hidalgo, have a younger son. The statement said the Department of Homeland Security alleged that he had been living illegally for years and that he has a history of driving offenses, including driving without a valid license, without insurance and speeding.