HOLLAND -- Holland resident Sherry Zhang faces an uncertain future--In early September her husband, Wei Zheng, was arrested by immigration authorities at their home and sits in a detention facility near Cleveland awaiting possible deportation to China. Sherry does not deny that her husband is in the U.S. illegally, but says she became a U.S. citizen in 2005 and the couple's three children, ages 5, 2 and ten months, were born in the United States.

"I want to say, 'please don't tear apart our family,'" Sherry said. 

In July 1991, Wei and his mother came to the United States on B-2 visas from Hong Kong. The Zhengs had immigrated to Hong Kong from China in 1983. Zheng graduated from Kearney High School in New Jersey in 1993 and then began working in Chinese restaurants. 

Zheng saved up enough money to move to Toledo in 1995, where he opened his own Chinese restaurant, the Rice King. Zheng sold the Rice King and opened up Wei Wei Noodles in January 2010. In October 2010, the restaurant received a prestigious four-star rating from The Blade.  The restaurant was routinely packed with customers and it was often difficult to get a table at lunch time. Former Toledo mayor Carty Finkbeiner was a regular customer. 

But on Sept. 1 of this year, Zheng was placed into custody by the U.S. Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and faces possible deportation to China. Sherry says since her husband's arrest, she was forced to close the restaurant, and with the family's sole breadwinner locked up, she is quickly running out of money. 

"Without him we don't have any income and I have three little kids to take care of," Sherry said.

From his detention cell, Zheng recently wrote a letter. "I know I made the mistake of lying to the Immigration Court in New York back in 1995. I am deeply sorry for what I have done," he wrote.

Despite being here illegally, Zheng pleads for mercy: "I am asking the U.S. government for mercy and forgiveness."