By Madeline Baró Diaz
Miami Bureau

MIAMI · For years, anti-Castro activist Ramon Saul Sanchez has claimed his right to return to his Cuban homeland in defiance of the U.S.
government's attempts to stop him.

Now the same country that prosecuted Sanchez to keep him out of Cuban territorial waters is going to court to determine if he should be sent
back to Cuba.

"It's really ironic," Sanchez said.

This fall, an immigration judge will determine whether he has a right to stay in the United States. Although Sanchez came to the United States
from Cuba in 1967, he never became a permanent resident, a status Cubans may obtain one year after they are paroled into the United
States under provisions of the Cuban Adjustment Act. Instead, Sanchez relied on the document granting him parolee status for decades and
obtained a Social Security number and driver's license that allowed him to live and work in the United States with few problems.

"I did not want to become a citizen or a resident so that my claim of the right to return home would be more pure," he said.

But when Sanchez's driver's license expired last year, he discovered that the renewal process would no longer be a breeze. After the Sept.
11 terrorist attacks Florida began requiring driver's license applicants to provide proof of U.S. citizenship or legal status in the country.
Sanchez had none, so he applied for permanent residency to obtain the necessary documents.

On Tuesday, when he showed up at the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services, Sanchez said immigration officials arrested him on
suspicion of being in the country illegally and told him to appear before an immigration judge to sort out his status. He was released on his
own recognizance.

BCIS spokeswoman Ana Santiago declined comment on Sanchez's case.

"We don't discuss anyone's file due to the Privacy Act," she said. "That's an issue between Mr. Sanchez and the United States government."

The immigration incident is the latest in Sanchez's dust-ups with the government.

Last year, a federal court jury in Key West acquitted Sanchez of charges he violated the South Florida Security Zone. The security zone, which President Clinton
created by proclamation, requires anyone leaving U.S. territorial waters with the intent of traveling into Cuban waters to obtain a permit from the Coast Guard.
Sanchez's group, the Democracy Movement, was refused permission several times but Sanchez and two other men went into Cuban waters anyway as part of a
memorial flotilla in July 2001.

Federal authorities seized the boat he used for that quick journey. In 1998, they had also confiscated the Human Rights, one of the group's boats, but Sanchez
staged a hunger strike and eventually got that boat back. A year before that, officials confiscated the group's flagship, the Democracia, but that boat, too, was
returned.

In the early 1980s, Sanchez spent four years in a federal prison after he refused to give a grand jury information about another Cuban exile group. When he left
prison, Sanchez said officials failed to return his parolee document along with his personal effects.

He continued his activism, however, and says he continued working to earn a living, most recently building and managing low-income housing.

Sanchez does not think the latest incident is an attempt by the U.S. government to persecute him.

"I want to believe it is a product of the complexity of the immigration laws after the events of the 9-11 attacks against the United States," he says.

Sanchez hopes, however, his immigration status will not be used to prevent his group from planning more flotillas, such as the one scheduled for July 12.

Even if he is ordered deported, however, it is unlikely that Sanchez will actually be returned to Cuba. The United States and Cuba do not have a deportation
agreement and in the past only those immigrants that Cuba has agreed to accept have been returned. Because of a 2001 U.S. Supreme Court decision, immigrants
cannot be detained indefinitely if their governments won't take them back.

Wilfredo Allen, Sanchez's attorney, said until a few years ago parole documents did not have expiration dates. Allen thinks that means Sanchez is legally in the
United States, although he concedes immigration authorities probably see it differently.

Sanchez doesn't think he'll be deported to Cuba, but says it's up to the conscience of U.S. officials.

"When I wanted to exercise my right to return home, you detained me and you wanted to put me in prison for 10 years," he said. "Now you're coming back and
saying `I'm going to deport you, handcuffed, and return you to Fidel Castro.' I'm not going to encourage you to do that but I'm not going to resist you."

Madeline Baró Diaz can be reached at mbaro@sun-sentinel.com or 305-810-5007.

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