A Sewickley father has been reunited with his family after being in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody for nearly two months.
Bruno Guedes da Silva, a native of Brazil, was freed on a $5,000 bond set by an immigration judge this week.
He reunited with the family Tuesday evening at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, where his 6-year-old daughter Maria Paula de Araujo Guedes was receiving treatments for Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
The family released photos Wednesday.
“They are still in the hospital, but happy to be together,” said family spokesperson Hadley Haas, of Glen Osborne.
She said they were focusing on each other and not accepting media requests Wednesday afternoon.
Guedes da Silva was arrested by agents during a traffic stop in Glen Osborne while driving to work with his wife in February.
Family friends picked him up from the Moshannon Valley Processing Center just outside Philipsburg in Clearfield County on Tuesday.
According to ICE agents, Guedes da Silva was wanted on charges of sale or transfer of firearms and unsworn falsification to authorities.
The charges, which were filed in January, stemmed from a form he filled out while attempting to buy a handgun at a McCandless firearms store in July 2024. Guedes da Silva answered “no” to a question on a federal Firearms Transaction Record form asking whether he was an alien or unlawfully in the United States.
Family attorney Thomas Farrell said his client believed he was legally in the country. That’s because he is seeking asylum and was permitted by the government to work and pay taxes. Guedes da Silva had a driver’s license and Social Security card, the attorney said.
Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr.’s office dropped gun charges earlier this month.
Stratton Nash, Sewickley resident and Quaker Valley School Board member, said many in the community were praying for Guedes da Silva’s release and safe return.
Nash hopes to meet with the family later this month and commended Beth Grunwald, an English as a Second Language teacher in the district, for going above and beyond supporting the family.
Grunwald is one of Maria’s teachers and has helped translate communications from her mother, Ana Paula de Araujo Pinto.
Grunwald and Nash were also part of a team that organized a prayer service for the family at Sewickley United Methodist Church.
“Beth is an extraordinary person and I just can’t provide enough adjectives for who she is as a person,” Nash said Wednesday afternoon. “She’s just a superstar of a teacher. Superstar as a person. I’m glad that she is working for Quaker Valley. This didn’t start with the detainment. This started with Maria.
“We’re all beside ourselves. We’re just texting one another, just euphoric,” Nash said. “That’s why you fight, and that’s why you live.
“You live for this stuff.”