Our New Anahuac

A new report by the National Immigration Law Center Confirms what most of us have already known: conditions in immigration detention facilities are unacceptable on the best of days and horrid on the worst.   An article in the Gainsville Times describes the report by the National Immigration Law Center, which cites sub-par conditions:

The report, based on confidential Immigration and Customs Enforcement documents obtained in litigation, alleges there are pervasive problems throughout the country’s immigration detention facilities, many of which are operated by private contractors.

Detainees are routinely denied visitation with family members, access to legal materials and regular recreation, according to the report. Many never get an explanation of their rights while being detained, the report claims.

“The conditions are much more harsh than they ought to be,” said the report’s co-author, Ranjana Natarajan. “This is a civil detention, and these folks are being treated like hardened criminals.”

I have been speaking to a woman who has had a dear friend in the north Houston immigration facility, which is adminstered by CCA, the private contractor listed in the above-mentioned article, which also adminsters the Hutto baby jail in Taylor, Texas.

This woman, describes purposely-inflicted mental anguish perpetrated against the detainees. She describes repeated instances of the guards grabbing drying undergarments and ripping them up in front of the detainees and later throwing them in the trash. She also described one instance in which a woman was denied medical attention because she was halfway unconscious and thereby unable to complete a medical request form. Several hours later, the appropriate exception was made and she was allowed medical attention.

The detainees are regularly served outdated food, sometimes on moldy serving trays. The health department was called and for a couple of miraculous days the detainees received regular food like baked chicken. The woman making the reports suspects that CCA was tipped off to the upcoming inspection.

Keep in mind that CCA is the same company whch administers Hutto, the detention facility in Taylor, Texas in which children are housed.

It is hoped that the woman described above will read several letters from different ex-detainees of the north Houston CCA detention facility at the August 29th Shut Down Hutto Rally at James Driver Park in Northeast Houston.

One of the biggest problems is that the private contractors that run this facility are unlicensed and unregulated. This is the same free-for-all set up that lead to the Abu Ghirab debacle in Iraq. The article continues:

This week, ICE officials did not deny the allegations contained in the report, vowing to continue to improve conditions. But Department of Homeland Security officials recently decided against creating uniform detention center standards that the National Immigration Law Center wants. ICE is supposed to conduct yearly evaluations of every detention center, but has no enforceable, binding legal rules on how inmates are treated, according to the report.

“It creates a lot of gray area,” Natarajan said. “Because (detention centers) are not expected to follow the rules, they’re all over the map.”

Join us on August 29th to Shut Down Hutto and to end the detention of children.