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The U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) inspector general
recently issued a
report on
the treatment of immigration detainees at five facilities used by
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to “house” them. The
report confirms that that actual practices at the facilities, which
include local government–run and prison corporation–owned prisons that
contract with the federal government, regularly violate standards set
forth in DHS’s detention manual. It also confirms that the process for
monitoring compliance with ICE’s detention standards is seriously
flawed.
On Feb. 2, the
Washington Post published an article
that describes the deplorable conditions in which about 2,000
undocumented people are being held at a “tent city” detention facility
in Raymondville, TX. According to the article, immigrants’ rights
advocates said that people confined in the facility “are confined 23
hours a day in windowless tents made of a Kevlar-like material, often
with insufficient food, clothing, medical care and access to
telephones. Many are transferred from the East Coast, 1,500 miles from
relatives and lawyers, virtually cutting off access to counsel.” The
article also describes how the Bush administration has embarked on a
prison-building and contracting spree in its attempt to carry out its
policy of holding detained undocumented people from countries other than
Mexico until they are ordered removed from the U.S. or depart
voluntarily.
On Jan. 25, 84 immigration detainees, the
National Immigration Project
of the National Lawyers Guild, and six other immigrant rights
organizations
formally petitioned DHS to issue legally enforceable regulations to
govern detention standards for immigration detainees. Currently,
immigration detainees’ treatment, including their living conditions,
health care, and access to legal materials, is governed by the DHS
detention manual, which is neither legally enforceable nor, as the DHS
inspector general found, universally applied.
NILC recently posted on its website a resource
that both legal advocates and detainees who read English will find
useful:
Immigration Detention and Removal: A Guide for Detainees and Their
Families, which was prepared by attorney Bryan Lonegan and
the Immigration Law Unit of the Legal Aid Society of New York City.
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