Family Residential Center in Tyler Texas, that houses families of illegal immigrants. Whole families, children, infants, all.
This facility had come under harsh criticism in the past year for failing to meet basic requirements mandated by congress, to the DHS and by extension the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
From the ACLU (3/6/2007)
In 2005 and 2006, Congress directed DHS to keep immigrant families together, either by releasing them or using alternatives to detention. If detention is necessary, Congress said immigrant families should be housed in non-penal, homelike environments.
...
Approximately 400 people are currently detained in Hutto, half of them children, and many of them are refugees seeking political asylum. What ICE calls a “Family Residential Facility” is in fact a converted medium-security prison that is still functionally and structurally a prison. Children are required to wear prison garb, receive only one hour of recreation a day, Monday through Friday, and some children did not go outdoors in the fresh air the whole month of December, 2006, according to legal papers filed today. They are detained in small cells for 11-12 hours each day where they cannot keep food and toys and they have no privacy, even when using the toilet.
This is the same facility that would on occasion separate parents from children, which is exactly what this facility's existence is supposed to prevent.
USA Today
An 8-year-old girl was separated from her pregnant mother and left behind for four days at a detention center established to keep immigrant families together while their cases are processed.
And why was that family here in the U.S.?
Banegas said the pair fled Honduras earlier this year to escape an abusive relationship and growing gang violence in that country, including attacks that broke her sister's ribs and left her with scars. She asked that her sister and niece not be named because of concerns for their safety.
Finally, 2 years later, changes are being made.
Statesman.com
The concertina wire is gone. So are the imposing steel doors in the booking area and the green and purple hospital-type scrubs issued to immigrants and their children. Also gone are the routine head counts by uniformed guards that awakened children in the middle of the night at the T. Don Hutto immigrant detention center.
The only reason these changes are being made is because of the public outcry, because of the coverage by the ACLU, NPR, the New York Times.
ICE plans to open more of these facilities (instead of say, electronic monitoring) which is troubling merely in the idea of more "family" prisons springing up. But beyond that, we must watch these new prisons, to make sure the "improvements" of the Hutto center continue. We must also be sure that conditions do not deteriorate once again to a travesty, once the spotlight has moved on.
No comments:
Post a Comment