Dear Editor,

I must begin by thanking those people who responded to my plight, highlighted by the Gazette last week - but I am so angry and ashamed of the way my country treated my retired 69 year old American husband.

I brought him here to see my great country and I stayed to spend time and visit my British family. He returned to the US after four months into his visitors visa. He went back to help a friend who had a stroke and was struggling to run his business. My husband was gone for six months. He flew back to Gatwick Airport on March 21st, 2018 to visit and travel with me on a visitors visa. He was stopped by immigration. He was intimidated and interrogated for 24 hours and told that he was stopped because he did not have a round trip ticket and he was most likely to overstay his visitors visa. He was searched, interrogated and incarcerated overnight. We were told he would be returned to Colorado at 9:45am the next morning.

The highlights of his interrogation were:

• He had overstayed his previous visa (which he had not and we have proof )

• He was probably not legally married in UK (He had a certified US marriage certificate in his passport showing we had been married for nine years)

• He would be a drain on the medical system in the UK (because he carried blood pressure medication with him)

• He had very little family left in US (He has outlived most of his family)

• He was accused of renting an apartment in his name illegally (It is in my name only as I am a UK citizen and of course I have proof)

They took his phone, laptop and passport and did not return them until he arrived back in Colorado the next day. He was not fed breakfast for the entire nine hour flight back to the US. He arrived exhausted, hungry and did not feel well.

While he was incarcerated he was told he could write a letter of appeal to the head of immigration at Gatwick. He did that but was told it was denied.

If I had the money for an emergency injunction I would have filed it. They cost £1000 plus £100 an hour for anything extra.

This is unbelievably shocking and now I am told that the only way I can bring him into the UK again is through a Spousal Visa. That is to say I have to sponsor him financially. I am retired and I don’t know if, without our combined income, I have enough money. Who does on their own at our age? This visa cost £993 and is non refundable, if it is denied, all 79 pages of it.

I am not allowed to fast track him, even if I could afford it, because he now has a case number and his passport is flagged with immigration.

I think this is taking things too far. A retired 69 year old schoolteacher from the US visiting his wife and family is not a threat.

If immigration profilers at Gatwick are so clever that they can predict someone will overstay their visa and be a drain on the UK economy, then perhaps they should use their crystal ball in other capacities, like predicting the weather and help out there.

I am now in the UK without my husband and being told by Jesse Norman’s office that I should contact one of their recommended solicitors. That is now about £3600 pounds plus £100 an hour for extras, whatever that is.

I am also looking at a twelve week wait to see if we qualify. At my age of 73 that is a long time.

So I am waiting for copies of the charges that my husband was handed when getting off the plane in the US. Along with his booking number which shows he was removed from the country.

This is so wrong by any standard and I am ashamed that my birth country has resorted to playing games with innocent peoples lives like this.

Susan Graham

Ross-on-Wye