The Filipino - American Legal Defense and Education Fund (FALDEF) has formally appealed to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to defer for humanitarian reasons the deportation of a New Jersey couple as the wife undergoes a long-term treatment of uterine cancer.
The application for deferred action status on behalf of Gideon and Rica Tonog, of Toms River, N.J., was filed this week by FALDEF president J.T. Mallonga
Along with that application is a petition letter bearing nearly 2,000 signatures of community residents — many of them non-Filipinos, including three mayors from Ocean County, N.J. — citing the extensive volunteer work and community service of the couple to benefit the large Filipino-American community in the area.
