Photo: Polk County Sheriffs Office
(Des Moines, IA) -- A Native American woman nearly faced deportation after a clerical mistake at the Polk County Jail.
“Dug deeper into it and realized it was incorrectly placed on this person; it should have been on another person,” said Lieutenant Mark Chance of the Polk County Sheriff’s Office.
Leticia Jacobo, 24, was detained in September for violating probation and driving while barred. The confusion occurred because Jacobo shared a last name with another woman scheduled for deportation.
The error was discovered when Jacobo’s mother called to confirm when she could pick up her daughter. Jail staff told her Jacobo was set to be turned over to ICE. The family provided a birth certificate, and Jacobo was eventually released.