Thread: Lawyers: Immigrant family detention still lengthy and unsafe

SAN ANTONIO (AP) — A group of immigrant rights lawyers say that detention of women and children caught crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally is lengthy and unsafe, challenging the government's claims that immigrant families

are held only briefly and that their detention doesn't violate a longstanding ban.

In a filing Thursday to California U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee, the lawyers also said the health and safety of immigrant children is being jeopardized by "hopelessly inadequate" medical and psychological care at the detention facilities

where they say the families are routinely kept for more than a month.

The government has said the mothers and children are held for just weeks while their asylum claims are processed. But the lawyers said the families are held for longer because immigration officials delay the screening and processing of

asylum claims, routinely hinder access to legal help and because bonds are too high for the women to pay to secure their release.

The immigration lawyers cited extensive complaints about health care at the facilities, including untreated or unrecognized ailments that resulted in children being hospitalized, lack of medicines, erroneous vaccinations and extremely long waits.

"Children are placed at risk every day," the lawyers said in the filing.

The government poured millions of dollars into two large detention centers in Texas for women and children after tens of thousands of immigrant families, mostly mothers with children from Central America, crossed the Rio Grande into the

U.S. last summer. A third, smaller facility, is in Pennsylvania.

All are overseen by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement but managed by private prison operators. They currently hold some 1,400 people, down from more than 2,000 earlier this summer.

Homeland Security and ICE officials have said they aim to release families as soon as they pass interviews that are the first hurdle to being granted asylum. In recent weeks, more women have been fitted with ankle monitors when released

from detention, sometimes under pressure and after bonds have been set, the lawyers said in the filing.

In late July, Gee ruled that Homeland Security should release all children from the centers "without unnecessary delay," along with any mothers not deemed a flight or national security risk. Many have petitioned for asylum after fleeing gang and domestic violence back home.

Last week, Homeland Security attorneys asked the judge to reconsider her ruling, saying detention times have been shortened and that further limiting family detention could spark another surge in immigrants from Central America.

The lawyers asked the judge to implement her earlier ruling calling for the quick release of detained women and children. Peter Schey, one of the lead attorneys and executive director of the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law,

called the policy of detaining children inhumane, adding that Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson should be "ashamed of himself" for "detaining young children in adult prisons that are unsafe."

Gee ruled in July that detaining children violates parts of a 1997 settlement covering all children in federal immigration custody, and that the facilities were not properly licensed to care for children.

Between Sept. 2013 and Oct. 2014, some 68,000 members of migrating families were caught at the border, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Between last October and June of this year, less than 27,000 have been

apprehended, which authorities say is due to better enforcement in the U.S. and Mexico.

http://www.newstimes.com/news/texas/...hy-6444187.php

We need to emphasize TO THE US CONGRESS that illegal aliens are actually FOREIGN PRINCIPALS under the law, and have no lobbying 'rights' as citizens do. All foreign lobbying is supposed to go only through registered lobbyists and is to be declared. Since they have entered the country illegally we are now forced to spend money on them,. yet they and their little legal advocates will find something to challenge the official process on!! So, basically illegal entry and then making demands!!! I will post important Congressional contacts once again. We need to protest the PRESUMPTION these people are displaying in challenging our policies and inflicting a greater burden on US citizens.

homeland.security@mail.house.gov (Chair Micheal McCaul, House Committee on Homeland Security)
nicolas.hagen@mail.house.gov (Chair Bob Goodlatte, House Judiciary Committee)
anna.bartlett@mail.house.gov (Chair Trey Gowdy, need I say more)
http://www.hsgac.senate.gov/contact/committee (Chair Ron Johnson, Senate Homeland Security)
Phone 202-224-5225 (Chair Chuck Grassley Senate Judiciary Committee)

The unhappy illegal aliens should ask their lawyers to expedite a release in exchange for a verified deportation executed and confirmed by the lawyer.

Originally Posted by Captainron

We need to emphasize TO THE US CONGRESS that illegal aliens are actually FOREIGN PRINCIPALS under the law, and have no lobbying 'rights' as citizens do. All foreign lobbying is supposed to go only through registered lobbyists and is to be declared. Since they have entered the country illegally we are now forced to spend money on them,. yet they and their little legal advocates will find something to challenge the official process on!! So, basically illegal entry and then making demands!!! I will post important Congressional contacts once again. We need to protest the PRESUMPTION these people are displaying in challenging our policies and inflicting a greater burden on US citizens.

homeland.security@mail.house.gov (Chair Micheal McCaul, House Committee on Homeland Security)
nicolas.hagen@mail.house.gov (Chair Bob Goodlatte, House Judiciary Committee)
anna.bartlett@mail.house.gov (Chair Trey Gowdy, need I say more)
http://www.hsgac.senate.gov/contact/committee (Chair Ron Johnson, Senate Homeland Security)
Phone 202-224-5225 (Chair Chuck Grassley Senate Judiciary Committee)

Excellent point. The only rights illegal aliens have in the US is to leave. The position of these illegal aliens and their lawyers is the same absurdity as asking a property owner who is prosecuting a trespasser to allow them to stay on the property, move into their home, eat the property owner's food, expect the property owner to entertain and educate their children, and provide the whole kit and kaboodle with medical care while they await trial for trespassing. The first thing law enforcement does in a trespassing case is remove the trespasser from the property which should be the same for illegal aliens trespassing into the United States. They must be removed, they must leave, they must be deported.

The law is simple. No citizenship + no papers = deportation. That's it. A fifth grader could process these illegal aliens out of here in 5 minutes, and it's time the adults we're paying big salaries to do this, do it.

Thank you, Judy. What conservatives don't seem to get, is that it is not enough to fuss and fume, or even to show out in great numbers and be outspoken proponents of our system. You also have to make sure all legal loose ends are tied up because if there is a loose thread someone will pull it an unravel it. Especially if there is a financial benefit for them. Illegal immigrants are advancing on so many fronts because they have activist lawyers willing to go to great lengths to work on their behalf. Ultimately they may be wrong, but they can bluff their way, too. We really need to make sure we are getting all legal loose ends tied up because they look for any loophole they can.

Can you imagine ANY other country where some 20 million people come in from foreign countries and start openly demanding the government?? Incredible.

Originally Posted by Captainron

Thank you, Judy. What conservatives don't seem to get, is that it is not enough to fuss and fume, or even to show out in great numbers and be outspoken proponents of our system. You also have to make sure all legal loose ends are tied up because if there is a loose thread someone will pull it an unravel it. Especially if there is a financial benefit for them. Illegal immigrants are advancing on so many fronts because they have activist lawyers willing to go to great lengths to work on their behalf. Ultimately they may be wrong, but they can bluff their way, too. We really need to make sure we are getting all legal loose ends tied up because they look for any loophole they can.

Can you imagine ANY other country where some 20 million people come in from foreign countries and start openly demanding the government?? Incredible.

Exactly, which proves our government is nothing but a bunch of stupid idiots drawing big salaries doing either nothing or the opposite of what they're paid to do.