The French government is urging Washington to release Marie-Thérèse Ross, an 86-year-old French woman being held in an immigration detention facility in Louisiana after she was arrested by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on 1 April. French consular officials have visited her and are in close contact with ICE authorities, while her family says they fear she will not survive the conditions of detention given her heart and back problems.
Marie-Thérèse's story is as romantic as it is unlikely. Originally from a village near Nantes in western France, she first met Billy — a retired US Army colonel and helicopter pilot — in the late 1950s while working as a bilingual secretary at a NATO base near Saint-Nazaire, on France's Atlantic coast. The two fell in love but were separated in 1966 when President Charles de Gaulle withdrew France from NATO's integrated military command, prompting the closure of US bases on French soil. Decades passed; both married other people. In 2010, they reconnected via social media, and after each had been widowed, Marie-Thérèse moved to Anniston, Alabama — a city in the US state of Alabama — to marry him in April 2024. Billy died in January 2025, just months after their wedding.
At the time of her husband's death, Marie-Thérèse had not yet received her green card — the US permanent residency permit — though her application was under way. She remained in the US to resolve inheritance matters, having planned to return to France later in the month. Her son, who has declined to be named publicly, told the French regional newspaper Ouest-France that his mother had also been in a dispute with one of her late husband's sons, who allegedly cut off water, electricity and internet at her home. A court hearing on that case was due eight days after she was arrested. ICE agents arrived at her home on 1 April, handcuffing her hands and feet. She was subsequently transferred to a detention centre in Louisiana, where she is reportedly held alongside around 70 other detainees.
Her family says she was left incommunicado for nearly a week before French consular officials in New Orleans were able to visit her and inform relatives. The French consulate confirmed it is "closely monitoring" the situation and maintaining communication with ICE. France's foreign ministry is working to secure her release and repatriation as soon as possible.
The case has drawn significant attention in France, arriving at a moment of broader diplomatic friction between Paris and Washington. Marie-Thérèse's son described the arrest scene as something from a bad American film, adding that fellow detainees have taken to calling his mother "unsinkable." For her family, the urgency is medical as much as legal: "She won't last a month in such conditions," her son warned.