GOP lawmakers ridicule aid for jailed immigrants

Originally found here.

By Brian Bennett

Tribune Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - Republicans in Congress mocked the Obama administration's plans to improve conditions for immigrants held in county jails and detention facilities Wednesday, saying that a raft of changes written by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement amounts to coddling lawbreakers.

In a hearing titled "Holiday on ICE," Rep. Lamar Smith (R., Texas), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, took aim at recent administrative changes designed to improve medical care for detainees, reduce incidents of sexual abuse, and increase access to safe water and outdoor recreation, among other changes.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement made the changes after coming under fire from news reports, human-rights groups, and internal investigations for putting immigrants who have not been convicted of crimes in detention facilities plagued by sexual assaults and inadequate medical care.

Democrats on the committee took aim at the sarcastic title of the hearing, saying it belittled the serious issue of the agency's poor track record of ensuring the safety and health of detainees in custody. To help make that point, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D., Calif.) displayed graphic photographs depicting immigrants with fatal wounds and medical conditions that went untreated in detention facilities.

The ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, John Conyers Jr. of Michigan, had asked Smith to reconsider the title of the hearing.

"I hope we can agree that the manner in which we treat immigrants in our detention facilities is not a laughing matter," Conyers wrote in a letter sent Tuesday.

Smith was undeterred.

"ICE has decided to upgrade accommodations for detained illegal and criminal immigrants," he said during the opening minutes of the hearing. "While we would all like to be upgraded, we don't have the luxury of billing the American taxpayers or making federal law enforcement agents our concierge."

"Detention is no holiday," said Gregory Chen, director of advocacy for the American Immigration Lawyers Association, who attended the hearing. "I think they should be embarrassed to describe people who are deprived of their liberty as if they were on vacation."

Sound Familiar? A United Nations Report Details Torture In United States Detention Centers

On February 29, 2012 the United Nations Human Rights Counsel released a report alleging that 16 gay and transgender immigrants detained in United States immigration detention facilities were tortured. The report states that these actions were a direct violation of articles 7 and 12 of the United Nations Convention against Torture. This report also notes that the United States government declined to respond to a United Nations communication dated August 19, 2011, regarding allegations of torture and ill-treatment in immigration detention facilities. The United Nations Human Rights Council is now demanding an immediate investigation of the conditions of detention, solitary confinement and ill-treatment of the immigrants, and to prosecute and punish the individuals that are responsible for torturing immigrant detainees.

As a side note it is also worth noting that the United States Department of Justice is so far refusing to cover detention facilities under the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA). Sadly this report appears to be just another example of why PREA should apply to Detention Centers.

This Blog writer has repeatedly gone on the record and stated that he observed behavior like this as having taken place at Corrections Corporation of America's Stewart Detention Center in Lumpkin, GA. Back in December of 2010 I discussed on this blog how the facilities Warden (Vance Laughlin) had openly mocked a transgendered detainee to a civil rights activist who was touring the facility. In December of 2011 I ran a three part series of articles directly addressing the rape and abuse of a transgendered detainee by both the staff and prisoners at Corrections Corporation of America's Eloy Detention facility in Eloy, Arizona. This writer has also previously gone on the record as having personally observed the placement of a transgendered detainee in Solitary confinement at the Stewart Detention Center for no reason other than being transgendered. This incident was one of the topics that I briefly discussed when I spoke at the "5th Annual Shut Down the Stewart Detention Center Rally" on November 18, 2011 in Lumpkin, GA.

The United Nations Human Rights Counsel report confirms as existing conditions in United States detention centers exactly like I have previously spoken about as having personally witnessed. This blog continues to feel that if Corrections Corporation of America can not humanly hold people in detention then they are failing to live up to the contracts that the United States government has made with them. Corrections Corporation of America regularly claims that they comply with both American Correctional Association (ACA) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement Performance-Based National Detention Standards (PBNDS). Yet the facts continue to state otherwise.

It is way past time for Corrections Corporation of America to be held accountable for the inhumane and deplorable conditions it forces upon both the immigrants in it's for-profit detention centers and the American citizens held in it's for-profit prisons. For this to happen the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency would have to take it's self seriously and actually enforce it's own Detention Standards on the abusive companies that it contracts to run these taxpayer supported money pits of misery. However, when the United States government declines to answer the United Nations Human Rights Council's inquiries into torture it kind of makes you wonder just how seriously our government takes the conditions inside it's own detention centers.

All opinions and allegations expressed here are just that. Please cross check anything you read before forming your own decision.

Part 2: Is Being Transgendered a Crime to Corrections Corporation of America?

During last months fifth annual "Shut Down the Stewart Detention Center" rally I very briefly spoke about a transgendered detainee at Corrections Corporation of America's (CCA) Stewart Detention Center (SDC) who was locked down in the facilities segregated housing unit. When I spoke at the rally I had no idea of the human rights abuses that had also been committed at CCA's Eloy Detention Center against a transgendered immigrant being detained there.

It's interesting to me that both detainees were held in a segregated housing unit setting. In the case of the transgendered detainee being held at the Stewart Detention Center I know for a fact that she was locked down in a segregated housing unit cell for a very prolonged period of time for no offense other than her lifestyle. Let there be no doubt that this happened as I was present and a witness to the events that took place. Knowing what I personally observed as having happened at CCA's Stewart Detention Center I can not help but wonder if this was also to a certain extent the same thing that was going on at CCA's Eloy Detention facility. If this is what is actually going on here then that would mean that Corrections Corporation of America is in effect locking transgendered detainees up in segregated housing unit's for no offense other than leading an alternative lifestyle.

Legally even in Detention facilities and prisons hearings must take place if detainees are deprived of rights and placed in disciplinary confinement for extended periods of time. Usually some sort of rule violation or crime is required to of happened. I'm very much aware of the pattern of abuse in disciplinary and confinement hearings that took place at CCA's Stewart Detention Center. It would be very interesting to see just what basis CCA used to lock these individuals up in the most restrictive and confining of available housing units. Is this yet another example of the abusive disciplinary procedures that are or were in effect at the Stewart Detention Center? Is being transgendered a confinable "crime" or disciplinary offence in CCA ran facilities?

As we discussed in yesterdays post proper supervision of detainees would in effect mean that personal lifestyles would probably not matter to the degree that they apparently did at one (or more) CCA for-profit run Detention Centers. Transgendered individuals in the United States are a very small minority group and yet these individuals manage to have a place in many other government controlled or influenced settings. Some local schools have dealt with transgendered students and as far as i'm aware it's not acceptable for these schools to just lock them away from other students in an in-school detention room. I also can't imagine a US city in current times that would task it's police department with rounding up all the transgender individuals to some sort of local transgendered internment camp. With this in mind I have to ask myself what makes it acceptable for Corrections Corporation of America to apparently behave this way? I guess if CCA is unable to adequately supervise and provide for the safety of transgendered individuals then perhaps it needs to stop taking taxpayer money for detaining them.

All opinions expressed here are just that. Please cross check anything you read before forming your own opinion.

Part 1: Documented Abuse of A Trangendered Detainee in a CCA Prison

On Monday a lawsuit was filed on behalf of a Transgendered detainee who was the victim of intolerable acts while being held at Corrections Corporation of America's (CCA) Eloy Detention Center.

In the worst of the incidents detailed in the lawsuit, Justin Manford a CCA Detention Officer at CCA's Eloy Detention Center, is alleged to of "maliciously forced the transgendered detainee to watch him masturbate into a white Styrofoam cup and then demanded that she ingest his ejaculated semen." Keep in mind that at this point there is absolutely no doubt that unacceptable things happened to this immigrant while she was being detained at CCA's Eloy Detention Center. After all on June 8, 2010 Manford was convicted of the crime of "Attempted Unlawful Sexual Contact" for his victimization of the transgendered detainee in question while he was employed by Corrections Corporation of America.

We have previously reported several times on the record levels of sexual assaults in Corrections Corporation of America's (CCA) for-profit prisons and detention centers. Sadly this trend is continuing. In fact one could quite effectively argue that this is not a trend but is instead a widespread and systemic pattern of sexual assaults and abuse. It is this former CCA employees belief that this is caused by a for-profit corporation that places profits above adequate supervision levels of both detainees and CCA's employees. How else does one explain the sexual activity that seems so prevalent at CCA's detention centers and prisons? How does someone masturbate into a cup on a job site and there is no co-workers around to notice? Could this happen where you work? Is your job site a controlled environment where supervision is the proven key ingredient to stopping most the major problems that could happen? It is my personal belief that this is because CCA has set staffing levels at minimal levels in order to reap higher profits while providing minimal or non-existent supervision to both detainees and employees. Incidents like this are perhaps a consequence of Corrections Corporation of America's own policies and practices that led to the low levels of supervision in the first place.

I am a very unlikely advocate for gay rights, I don't think I have ever known anyone that identified with this type of belief. But to me that's inconsequential. What we are talking about here is basic human rights. I would also argue that the undeniable patterns of sexual abuse we are seeing within Corrections Corporation of America prisons and detention centers is a natural progression of the government turning a blind eye to CCA's proven track record of being a leader in the sexual abuse of detainees and prisoners.

All opinions expressed here are just that. Please cross check anything you read before forming your own opinion