Thread: Immigrants Challenge U.S. System of Detention

May 1, 2008
Immigrants Challenge U.S. System of Detention
By NINA BERNSTEIN

Immigrants who spent time in detention while fighting deportation filed a federal suit on Wednesday against Michael Chertoff, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, demanding that the agency issue legally enforceable regulations for its detention centers.

No enforceable standards now exist for the immigrant detention system, a rapidly growing conglomeration of county jails, federal centers and privately run prisons across the country.

The lawsuit, filed by the immigrants and their advocates in United States District Court in Manhattan, contends that the lack of such regulations puts hundreds of thousands of people a year in substandard and inconsistent conditions while the government decides whether to deport them, leaving them subject to inadequate medical care and abuse.

The suit is based on the Administrative Procedures Act, which allows courts to force agencies to respond to rulemaking petitions. In January 2007, the plaintiffs filed a petition requesting that Homeland Security make its detention standards enforceable, but have received no response.

Homeland Security is one of the largest jailers in the world, “but it behaves like a lawless local sheriff,â€

Gee, their countries provide illegal immigrants detained in their countries such great jails. I suppose they would like us to house them at the Fairmont.