A federal government agency on Friday recommended the immediate relocation of all detained immigrants from a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in New Mexico, citing unhealthy conditions, staff shortages and failures. security detected during an inspection.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Inspector General’s Office issued the rare recommendation in a report on the Torrance County Detention Center, which detains immigrants facing deportation to Estancia, New Mexico. The office said it conducted a three-day unannounced inspection of the facility in early February.
Investigators at the inspector’s general office said they documented “huge” problems at the New Mexico Detention Center, which had 176 immigrants during the inspection, including problems that “exposed staff and detainees to unhealthy conditions.” and avoidable. “
More than half of the facility’s 157 detainee cells, according to the report, had plumbing problems that included sinks and sinks that were clogged or otherwise inoperable. Inspectors also noted that they found water leaks, mold and lack of hot water at the facility, which according to the report was affected by security breaches due to lack of staff, poor supervision of detainees. and operational blind spots.
Friday’s report also described a “critical” staff shortage that violated staffing standards set by the ICE. During the inspection, the New Mexico facility had 133 full-time employees, or 54 percent of the required 245-member staffing level, the inspector general’s office said.
“We recommend the immediate relocation of all detainees from the facility unless and until the facility ensures adequate staffing and adequate living conditions,” the office wrote in its report.
The office said it plans to publish another report detailing other “deficiencies” in the Torrance facility related to the classification of detainees, COVID-19 mitigation measures, medical care, access to legal services and additional issues.
ICE management strongly refuted the findings of Friday’s report, declining the detainee’s relocation recommendation and questioning the methods of reporting to the inspector general’s office. In a March 7 letter, Jason Houser, ICE’s acting chief of staff, said the agency had “serious concerns about the accuracy and integrity of this report.”
“In some cases, the OIG appears to have falsified or misrepresented the evidence and ignored the facts presented to it in order to reach preconceived notions,” Houser wrote in his letter to Inspector Joseph Cuffari. DHS General.
Houser accused staff inspecting the Torrance facility of staging a photo of a detainee drinking water from a mop sink and refusing to wait for the taps to produce hot water. He also questioned the inspector’s impartiality, saying facility officials overheard the inspector say derogatory comments about the facility during the first hour of the inspection.
Steven Corse, a spokesman for CoreCivic, the private company that operates the Torrance Detention Center, echoed ICE’s statements, saying that “the inspectors responsible for this report acted in a profound manner. ethics, including distorting evidence to negatively portray the installation “.
In a March 10 letter to ICE Acting Director Tae Johnson, CoreCivic’s attorney general, Cole Carter, urged the agency to review the conduct of the staff who inspected the facility.
“The statements contained in the report and the actions they represent are so atrocious and defamatory that they require your immediate attention to ensure that those responsible for making them are held accountable,” Carter wrote.
The DHS inspector general said he was behind the findings of Friday’s report, noting that ICE itself in early March reported to CoreCivic that the Torrance detention center was understaffed and plagued by other deficient conditions.
“CoreCivic has failed to demonstrate its ability to provide a safe environment for staff and noncitizens, provide the security needed for proper facility control and security measures, and care to ensure maintenance adequate facilities, general cleanliness and personal hygiene needs “. ICE said in a March 1 discrepancy report.
“The impartiality, independence and integrity of our employees are essential to our oversight work and will continue to do so,” the inspector general’s office said.
The ICE detains unauthorized immigrants, asylum seekers and other non-citizens facing deportation proceedings, such as permanent residents who have been convicted of certain crimes. Last week, the agency had 20,146 immigrants in its detention network, which consists primarily of county prisons and private prisons, government data show.
The Biden administration has pledged to reform the ICE detention. Last year, he stopped detaining immigrants at two Georgia and Massachusetts facilities affected by allegations of ill-treatment of detainees. However, the ICE has yet to take public action to end the for-profit detention, a promise President Biden made during the campaign.
In a January interview with CBS News, DHS Secretary Alexander Mayorkas said “arrest reform is my priority.”
DHS representatives did not respond to a request as to whether Mayorkas agreed with the Inspector General’s report and was addressing it, or whether the Secretary agreed with the ICE rebuttal.
Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online.
“Secretary Mayorkas has committed to a zero-tolerance policy for conditions below ICE detention rules, but she is running a prison system that is openly cruel,” said Heidi Altman, director of policy at the ICE. National Immigrant Justice Center. “How many reports will it take until the U.S. government admits it’s time to end the use of immigrant detention?”
- In:
- immigration
- US Immigration and Customs Service
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