The teenagers, ranging from 15 to 17 years old, returned Wednesday to San Diego after the federal government allowed them to stay with their parents while they fight their cases in immigration court.

"I never imagined this would happen to me," Stephanie Jimenez, 16, said Thursday in Spanish. "I'm now with my family, I want to go to school, just like I always have."

The students' arrests on May 20 at a trolley station in Old Town San Diego provoked outrage among immigrant rights advocates who questioned whether border agents should be arresting children.

Lilia Velasquez, an immigration attorney representing the students, said authorities didn't follow required procedures, and failed to give the students a special form that outlines their right to speak with an adult.

"They treated this as any other raid," Velasquez said. "I think it is implicit of the mere fact they agreed to this rare type of procedure of paroling the students back into the U.S. that they did something wrong. And they want to do damage control."

Daryl Reed, a supervisory Border Patrol agent in San Diego, acknowledged the government rarely allows foreign citizens to enter the country for humanitarian reasons, but he denied any wrongdoing.

He said at least one of the teens spoke with a parent from the trolley station during the arrests and the teenagers signed a piece of paper agreeing to voluntarily return to Mexico without seeing an immigration judge.

"We did everything by the book," Reed said.

Jimenez said she and two other students were arrested after a man in plainclothes started talking to her, flashed his Border Patrol badge and asked whether she had any legal papers.

Jimenez said she dialed her mother quickly on her cell phone and was handcuffed and taken to a station. She said her fingerprints were taken and she was told to sign a piece of paper that let her be taken to Mexico. The students were then turned over to a Mexican social services official at the border.

For nearly a month, she and another student have been staying with a family friend in Tijuana. It was not clear where the third student stayed.

Velasquez declined to reveal the teens' immigration status or nationality. Reed said the students told Border Patrol agents they were undocumented and originally from Mexico.

The government will continue trying to deport the teens, who will fight their case in immigration court. Velasquez said she expects the students will have a hearing in a month or two.

"What if this were to happen again? All the schools would be empty," Velasquez said. "This is not the message we want to send out to the public. It is not good policy, and it is wrong."