Mexican vacation turns sour for Auburn couple

Robert Andrew Langley teaches chemistry at LaFayette High School and lives Auburn. He has no criminal record and even pals round with Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones. He’s a model citizen.

Don’t tell that to immigration officials in Mexico City.

Langley, 51, was detained for four hours at Mexico City International Airport on Dec. 26 in a room that amounted to a holding cell, questioned about his true identity, and then was abruptly flown back to Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta without food, drink or notifying his wife, Gail, who was left behind in the foreign terminal.

Officials believed Langley, regardless of any U.S. paperwork or documents, could be another man who is banned from the country.

That Friday afternoon was intended to be the beginning of a planned vacation during which the couple would celebrate its 25th wedding anniversary on New Year’s Eve in the art-friendly Mexican town of Oaxaca. The Langleys, traveling with Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones and his wife, Judy, had planned the trip for a year.

After arriving in Mexico City from Atlanta, the vacation went south as soon as the Langleys stepped off their AeroMexico jet.

“We were getting ready to go through customs, I swiped my passport, they looked at the (computer) screen and said they would be right back,” Langley said.
That was the first sign of trouble.

“The attendant returned and said, ‘Please come with me.’ They took us to a room guarded by immigration police. My name was matched to another person who was kicked out of Mexico in 2007.”

Robert Andrew Langley. The name is welcomed by area schoolchildren in Auburn, blacklisted by the Mexican government.

“I don’t know how to say ‘my husband is not a felon’ in Spanish,” Gail Langley said.

‘No leeway for discussion’

Langley would spend the majority of his vacation in a little room, where he was interrogated.

“They asked me when was the last time I had been to Mexico City,” he said. “I told them I had never been to Mexico City. They showed me pieces of paper that said ‘You were here two years ago.’ But they did not have a mug shot of this other person. At first, I thought it was amusing. I thought that for sure, they would just have to make a phone call. I wasn’t angry. I was annoyed more than anything.”

Jones remains puzzled about the Mexican misunderstanding.

“Here, you have one American citizen and it locks it (the airport) down,” Jones said. “Every day — and estimates vary — there are hundreds, if not thousands of individuals illegally immigrating into the U.S.”

Jones said he identified himself to the immigration officials and assured them of his friend’s identity. It didn’t go very far.

“The federal police take their jobs very seriously in Mexico,” Jones said with a laugh. “There was no leeway for discussion. There is documentation readily available, to establish that Bob Langley was nowhere in Mexico in 2006 or 2007.”

Jones said he has sent an inquiry to U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers’ office to help “clear these types of circumstances.”

“But my purpose is to help Bob get his name cleared.”

Messages left at the Embassy of Mexico in Washington, D.C., were not returned.

A U.S. State Department spokesperson said, “If you don’t have the proper documents, those detentions happen all around the world based on jurisdiction. It’s similiar to the United States’ no-fly list. People can be questioned further as part of a nation’s respective immigration process.”

‘They lied to us’

The couple believes the immigration officials had no intention of allowing Langley to remain in the country, whether proof of his identity was presented, or not.

“They were just holding him until the next flight to Atlanta,” said Gail Langley, who unsuccessfully attempted to contact the U.S. consulate from the terminal. “They (airport officials) lied to us.”

Langley was forced to sign “10 pages” of papers he could not read. The words were in Spanish.

“I looked at these papers and said, ‘What does this say?’ They were not helpful at all. They basically ignored me. I have no idea what I signed. I’d have been put in jail if I didn’t sign them,” he laughed.

While Gail scurried through the terminal to find her husband a quick meal — something he hadn’t enjoyed for a while, aiport security whisked him away for a flight back to the United States, leaving his carry-on bag in the interrogation room. With that, Bob Langley was headed home. His wife and friends were in Mexico, vacationing without him.

Gail Langley describes Oaxaca, near the Guatemalan border, as the “French Quarter gone Spanish.”

“I would have had a great time if I had not been so sad,” she said. “It was going to be very romantic, with margaritas on the veranda of the hotel. Instead, I was with Jay and Judy. I had this great hotel room, and I was all by myself in this suite.”

Gail vacationed and touned the south Mexican art scene, while her husband “did a lot of yard work.”

The group did, however, cut the trip short and returned to the U.S., where the Langley’s celebrated their anniversary on Dec. 31 at a local pizza restaurant.
Asked if the couple planned another Mexican vacation in the future, Bob Langley quickly answered, “No.”