By Georgina Brennan

TWO Co. Waterford cousins were arrested on a train in Montana for overstaying their visitor visas, were held at gunpoint, clapped in irons and brought to a penitentiary where they were placed with hardened criminals including murderers and rapists.

Their only “crime” was overstaying their tourist visas.

Alan and Cliff Whelan, both 23, from Waterford City were arrested on November 26 in Montana by four cops carrying out spot checks for visa status on a Seattle-bound train.

The policeman were enforcing the 100 mile rule which allows law enforcement to ask for identification of people who are traveling within 100 miles of the U.S. border.

The two men are currently in jail in Aurora, just outside Denver, and their families are still unable to determine when they will be deported.

The Irish Department of Foreign Affairs have assured the Whelan families that their sons will be home for Christmas, but the Irish Voice can reveal the two have little hope of being released this week.

“They aren’t going today or tomorrow. We don’t know when they will be getting out of here. It’s a security issue, they don’t tell us,” said a spokesperson for the detention center.

The first cousins had come to Boston for the summer but decided to stay on. They decided to take a trip to San Francisco but first went to Chicago. After Chicago they bought tickets to Seattle.

It was on this train that they were arrested. They had overstayed their visas by three months.

The men, who had been working as bricklayers in Boston, have told their families that during their transfer by bus from Montana, where they were arrested, they were shackled and chained with 16 other prisoners and accompanied by heavily armed guards who held guns to their backs as they walked into prison.

First they were placed in Hill County Detention Center in Montana with the general prison population, which included murderers, burglars and rapists. It was not until December 9 that they were moved to an immigration facility, the Aurora Detention Center, where guards say everyone is imprisoned for immigration violations and nothing else.

“They are held with other people who have immigration problems, violations, not prison population,” said a spokesperson. “And they are fine.”

According to a friend of the family, Alan’s father Pat has been speaking by phone to his son, and both young men are being locked up 23 hours a day. They have been allowed one three-minute phone call a week. Pat says he is hopeful the two will be put on a plane soon.

Irish politician John Deasy (Fine Gael), who represents the county the cousins are from, has been telling reporters in Ireland and abroad that serious attempts are being made to secure the release of the Whelans but so far nobody, including the Irish government, is able to help.

“This is causing resentment among the Irish community and it’s not acceptable. I argued that it’s not right to jail Irish people with general criminals when they haven’t committed a real crime,” he said.

According to figures Deasy has obtained, 290 Irish people have been deported from the U.S. in the past five years.

According to recent news reports, the U.S. Ambassador to Ireland James Kenny has promised to investigate complaints that some Irish citizens have been detained for up to three months pending a decision on whether they should be deported.

Last week Kenny met with Deasy. “I asked him what reaction he would have if American people were being held in Mountjoy for months before being sent back. He said he would raise the issue with the head of America’s immigration services and hopefully this will lead to a solution to this problem,” Deasy said.

Overstaying a tourist visa is not a felony. Under U.S. law it is a misdemeanor punishable by deportation.