On a gray November afternoon, outside a U.S. Department of Homeland Security building in San Francisco, a dozen people joined hands to pray.

“We gather in the firm conviction we must stand always on the side of love,” said Tovis Page, intern minister at Unitarian Universalists of San Mateo. “Love does not separate, isolate, abandon or punish. Separating families is never an act of love; wrongful imprisonment is unjust on every level.”

The group, which had grown to over 20 people, including two nuns and several pastors, lined up to go through metal detectors at the building’s entrance, and then proceeded to fill up and overflow the wooden benches in a fourth floor immigration courtroom. The occasion was a bond hearing to decide whether Alexey Kharis, a political refugee from Russia who’d been held in immigration detention since August 2017, could go home to his wife and two children in Palo Alto while his case proceeds.

The group at 630 Sansome St. that day was composed of immigrant accompaniers — people who go with asylum seekers to their court hearings and check-ins with federal authorities, and sometimes to schools, hospitals and other meetings.

It was an outsize showing of support for a routine affair that might otherwise proceed in relative obscurity. Their presence serves as comfort to those facing deportation — but also as a statement to the judges and government officials whose decisions have life-changing consequences.

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“In this day and age, with the things going on, we need a village, and that’s what we’re doing,” said Sister Joan Marie O’Donnell of the Burlingame Sisters of Mercy, who was among those at Kharis’ hearing.

Accompaniers express support for immigrants in the simplest of ways: by being present and bearing witness. Accompanying people to court hearings doesn’t require fluency in other languages or legal knowledge. While the concept has been around for years, the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration has galvanized more people in the Bay Area and nationally to get involved.

And a clash between local and federal officials has changed their work in an ironic way: The accompaniers are often not able to actually accompany asylum seekers in person. There are no longer any ICE detention facilities in the Bay Area. Rather than pay to transport immigrants from detention centers elsewhere, ICE has them videoconference in to their hearings.

“There’s a vast network of people trying to help our immigrant neighbors who are caught up in snares of deportation and detention,” said the Rev. Deborah Lee, who heads Oakland’s Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity, one of the nonprofits that coordinates accompaniment statewide. Her group and others are actively seeking people who want to be on accompaniment teams as well as to offer housing to asylum seekers.

Courtroom audiences “show judges that this person matters, has community ties and community support,” Lee said. “Judges sit there all day deciding on people’s lives. We’re trying to help humanize people who otherwise could be just another name, another number.”

Accompaniers may get to know specific immigrants. In those cases, “they may testify as character witnesses, if they’ve known someone for (a while) and developed a relationship,” said Rebecca Merton, national visitation network coordinator in Oakland at Freedom for Immigrants, another nonprofit that coordinates accompaniment.

Accompaniment teams, many of them formed at local congregations, often go further. They may visit immigrants in detention, help them find child care and housing (sometimes providing it), navigate health care systems, give rides to appointments and detention visits, and assist with fundraising and letter writing.

Many say they feel called to help because of their interest in social justice.

“It particularly strikes a chord with us because many members are of Eastern European Jewish backgrounds who would not be here today if some members of their families had not been helped by individuals, churches or others in the second World War,” said Julie Litwin, co-chair of the immigration committee at Kehilla Community Synagogue in Oakland. “And in the more distant past, Jews have many times been immigrants in places that were not our own land, where we were at the mercy of people to be kind to us.”

“My congregation and other communities of faith want to bring whatever impact we can, using our place of privilege and our intent to say, ‘No, this will not stand, because it’s wrong,’” said Rev. Ben Meyers of the Unitarian Universalists of San Mateo.

Even when the asylum seekers are not physically present, they are aware of the supporters, either because their lawyers tell them or because the camera briefly gets directed to the courtroom audience.

“Clients feel empowered by the people there,” said Lizzie Davis, a staff attorney with Deportation Defense & Legal Advocacy Program of Dolores Street Community Services in San Francisco. “A lot of immigration processes and procedures are incredibly isolating, especially for detained clients. Seeing supportive faces has a huge impact on them.”

Judges get the message as well, she and other attorneys said.

“To win bond, you have to demonstrate that you are not a danger to the community,” said Alejandra Rosero, another attorney at the legal nonprofit. “When the community shows up at hearings, it creates a huge impact that judges see.”

It’s also valuable for community members to learn how the system works. “People don’t know a lot about immigration hearings and immigration detention; the reality of what an adversarial system it is,” Rosero said.

Supporters find immigrants to work with in various ways, including word of mouth. Lawyers may refer them, they may meet families at protests or court. Some detention centers allow signup sheets for immigrants to request community support, Merton said.

When Lourdes Barraza of San Jose visited her husband at the Contra Costa West County Detention Facility in Richmond last year, she encountered protesters outside. (That facility has since severed its ICE contract and no longer jails undocumented immigrants.)

“We connected, and they supported me in many, many ways,” she said. “Accompaniment made a huge difference. I was desperate, ready to give up. They gave me the motivation I needed to feel I was doing something to bring my husband home.”

Her accompaniment team checked in with her daily and helped her hold vigils, mount a phone call campaign, organize press conferences and collect donations.

Kehilla Synagogue’s Litwin said working with Barraza was an emotional experience.

“We were extremely involved in that case and its ups and downs,” she said. At one hearing when a decision was postponed, “Everyone was sobbing; it felt so horrible, so painful and unnecessary to treat someone like that.”

After six months in detention, Barraza’s husband, Fernando Carrillo, was released to live again with Barraza and their three daughters, all four of whom are U.S. citizens, although the government has since appealed his release.

Barraza, who studied criminal justice, had worked as a group supervisor at Santa Cruz County Juvenile Hall. Now she works with the Interfaith Movement, helping people in situations similar to that of her husband. “After that ordeal I see the criminal justice system in a very different way,” she said. “I couldn’t see myself going back to that area.”

Kharis, who was being detained in Marysville (Yuba County), attended his bond hearing via videoconferencing.

During a break in the proceeding, Rev. Lee from the Interfaith Movement asked the judge if Kharis’ supporters could greet him. The judge rotated the camera toward the packed courtroom as the two dozen or so people waved and shouted “Hi, Alexey.”

The short hearing ended with temporary release for Kharis, with a $100,000 bond and an ankle bracelet.

The strangers in the gallery broke into cheers and applause and embraced Kharis’ wife, Anna, as she wiped away tears.

“It was like we were all holding our breath, and suddenly we could breathe again,” Lee said.

Kharis later reflected on the experience in a Facebook post thanking his courtroom supporters.

“You’ve made the dream come true; without you I’m not sure I could make it,” he wrote. “And even when I was in detention— to know that all you care and fight for me — it made my life hopeful.”

Carolyn Said is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: csaid@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @csaid