About 40 Ossining residents and immigration advocates rallied outside the Federal Building in Lower Manhattan Monday chanting for justice, to protest the detention of Diego Ismael Puma Macancela last week. The 19-year-old was arrested last Thursday morning, the same day of his senior prom.

Steve Choi, executive director of the New York Immigration Coalition, called the case "one more example of the injustice and the inhumanity of the Trump administration."

"Instead of wearing a tuxedo and putting a boutonniere on his wrist, he was wearing an orange jumpsuit and shackles," said Choi.

Macancela came to the U.S. illegally from Ecuador in December of 2014. He and his mother, Rosa Ines Macancela Vazquez, both lost their asylum cases in November of 2016, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. 

The group Neighbors Link of Northern Westchester is now representing Diego while another advocacy group is representing his mother. Both will file appeals in the hopes of halting their deportations. They are currently being held at different detention centers in New Jersey and New York.

A cousin, Gabriela Macancela, said they either didn't know they could file an appeal last year or didn't have the money. She told supporters she'd been in touch with Diego by phone and that he's scared. "We're trying to do everything we can to get him out," she added.

State assemblyman Francisco Moya of Queens, who is an Ecuadorian-American, said he was sending a letter to the Department of Homeland Security about the case. He scoffed at the notion that the teenage boy posed any danger, noting he had no criminal record.

"Is Diego a threat to our national security?" Moya asked, and the crowd yelled, "No."

Choi, of the Immigration Coalition, said it's unusual but not unheard of for immigration agents to detain a high school student. "The Trump administration has said they're going after the most dangerous people," he explained. "What we've realized is they're going after everyone. I think this puts the truth to that lie."

Raymond Sanchez, the Ossining schools superintendent, said the case elevated fears among his immigrant students. "They start asking a lot of questions and begin to worry more and more," he said.

Michael Macancela, 15, a tenth grader at Ossining High School, said his cousin Diego fled gang violence in Ecuador. He planned to finish high school this year and then attend a mechanics program through BOCES.

"He was seeing brightness in a dark place, he never thought he'd see bright."