The Rigal Family

In 2019, Rev Ramon Rigal and his wife Pastor Adya Exposito Leyva were imprisoned for home-schooling their children. They didn’t want their children Ruth and Noel to go to a state-run school where they would be bullied for their beliefs, so they enrolled their children with an online school.

Parents are legally required to send their children to state-run schools in Cuba, and protecting Ruth and Joel in this manner is illegal. As a result, in April 2019, both Raman and Adya were imprisoned for their decision to home-school their children, and Ruth and Joel were separated, having to live in different homes for many months.

Adya was released from detention in March 2020, after serving over 11 months of an 18-month sentence for the alleged crime of ‘other acts against the normal development of a minor’. Ramon was released in June 2020 after serving 14 months of a two-year sentence. For most of his imprisonment, Ramon was in a maximum security unit where he was denied conditional freedom, and was only allowed one visit per month.