Williamson County's Response to Sexual Abuse Allegations at T. Don Hutto

JAMES R. WILSON

WILLIAMSON COUNTY SHERIFF

508 South Rock Street

Georgetown, Texas 78626

Phone (512) 943-1300 * Fax (512) 943-1444

August 19, 2010

MEDIA RELEASE

Arrest made in T. Don Hutto Investigation.

On May 11, 2010, the Williamson County Sheriff’s Office received a report from the Austin Police Department regarding an employee of the T. Don Hutto facility in Taylor, Texas. The report detailed how a female made contact with an Austin Bergstorm International Airport employee advising them that she had been inappropriately touched outside her clothing while being transported from the T. Don Hutto facility to the airport. The report identified an employee of the Correction Corporation of America as being the suspect of this allegation. The Correction Corporation of America is the contracted company at the T. Don Hutto facility which houses federal immigration detainees. Due to the facility being in Williamson County, The Williamson County Sheriff’s Office immediately began an investigation into this allegation. On the same date, Donald Charles Dunn, a Resident Supervisor at the T. Don Hutto facility and employee of Correction Corporation of America was identified as the suspect of this allegation. Mr. Dunn met with Williamson County Detectives on May 20, 2010 and explained to detectives that he told the women he was going to “frisk” them and then inappropriately touched their breasts, crotch and buttocks. Mr. Dunn advised that he didn’t do this for safety concerns but as self gratification. Mr. Dunn indicated to Detectives that he had done this to numerous other women while performing his duties as a transport officer. A large scale investigation into the current locations of other possible victims began immediately after Mr. Dunn’s interview. Detectives from Williamson County and Immigration and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Office of Professional Responsibility/San Antonio) set out to make contact with several of the possible victims who had located across the country since bonding out of the facility. Mr. Dunn was subsequently terminated from his contract employment with Correction Corporation of America when the allegation was first reported to authorities.

The investigation revealed that all of the possible victims of Mr. Dunn had been released on bond from the T Don Hutto federal facility and were being transported to the Austin-Bergstrom Airport or bus station. It was during these courtesy transports that Mr. Dunn would stop at different locations in the areas of both Travis and Williamson County. Williamson County is pursuing charges against Mr. Dunn for his actions in the area of the convenience store located at 20306 FM 973. The transports usually occurred in the early morning hours when it was still dark.

Three women that were interviewed told detectives that they were inappropriately touched outside of their clothing on their breast, virginal or buttocks areas. Two of the three victims said they were unlawfully restrained. The two charges of unlawful restraint occurred when Mr. Dunn took the victims to the above location against their will. One victim told officers she thought she would be either “killed or violated”. Several women who were interviewed denied any contact with Mr. Dunn. Some of those advised that they were transported in the daylight hours and or it was raining. Several women could not be located for questioning because of out of date addresses with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

DONALD CHARLES DUNN

Date of Birth 12/23/1979 of 14408 Varrelman Street in Austin was arrested on August 19, 2010 at 4:50pm in Austin. Mr. Dunn will be booked into the Williamson County Jail where he awaits arrangement on a $35,000.00 bond. Mr. Dunn faces 3 counts of official oppression and 2 counts of unlawful restraint. Due to the late booking of Mr. Dunn, No mug shot is available till August 20, 2010.

The investigation is still ongoing at this time. Anyone having information about a victim or Mr. Dunn’s crimes is encouraged to call the Williamson County Sheriff’s Office at 512-943-1300 or the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency.

*On August 20, 2010, at 10:00am, the Williamson County Sheriff’s will discuss and answer questions regarding limited aspects of the investigation with the media. The conference will be at the Williamson County Sheriff’s Office located at 508 Rock Street in Georgetown, Texas. No further Information will only be available till 10:00am August 20, 2010*

The T. Don Hutto facility opened in May, 2006 as a family residential facility housing families while they awaited their immigration hearings or decisions The facility changed over to housing females in a separate area of the facility in February, 2008 and in September, 2009 the entire facility began housing only females. The facility is operated under an Immigration and Customs Intergovernmental Service Agreement with Williamson County. Williamson County contracts with Corrections Corporation of America for the facility's day-to-day operation. A new agreement with Williamson County became effective February 1, 2010. The facility employees 169 Correction Corporation of America Staff, 30 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Staff and 43 United States Public Health Services Staff.

For further media information contact:

Sergeant John Foster

Williamson County Sheriff’s Office

Special Investigations Unit

Pager: 512-208-2188

WillCo to keep closer tabs on Hutto

Williamson County authorities say they will supervise employees at the T. Don Hutto detention facility more closely after a worker was accused of fondling women.

Donald Charles Dunn, 30, is charged with official oppression and unlawful restraint, Class A misdemeanors.

The facility in Taylor houses women who are illegal immigrants. Williamson County contracts with the private company, Correction Corporation of America (CCA) to run it.

In May, a woman told Austin police a man inappropriately touched her while she was being driven from the facility to Austin-Bergstrom International Airport.

Area law enforcement investigated. They say they found five women in Williamson County and three in Travis County who say Dunn groped them when he was taking them to the airport or bus station.

Williamson County Sheriff’s spokesman John Foster says its contract with CCA states that two people will be present during transport but Dunn was alone when the alleged crimes happened.

The women told detectives they believed Dunn was a law enforcement officer and had the right to frisk them. Foster says Dunn was a resident supervisor and not an officer. CCA has fired Dunn.

News 8 Austin: T Don Hutto employee fired after alleged sexual abuse

A transport officer at the T. Don Hutto residential facility in Taylor was fired after confessing to inappropriately touching inmates after they were released.
Donald Dunn was in charge of taking former detainees to a destination of their choice after they were released from custody.

One woman was taken to Austin-Bergstrom International Airport and told an ABIA employee about the inappropriate behavior. The woman’s outcry was enough to get the investigation started.

All of the victims were females previously held by the federal government concerning their immigration status.

Sgt. John Foster is a Williamson County Deputy Sheriff that also serves as a monitor for the T. Don Hutto Residential Center. Foster had strong words for Dunn Friday.

"They deserve to come into this country and not be assaulted, he didn't give that to them," he said.

According to authorities, Dunn was responsible for the transport of 72 detainees while employed at the federal facility. Officials attempted to interview all of those he had transported during his time as an officer. Forty-two detainees were questioned, 30 women could not be found.

Sgt. Foster said the investigation went coast to coast in an attempt to locate potential victims.

Lisa Graybill is the legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas.

"I believe many of these women are asylum seekers, so that means they fled persecution, violence, possible sexual violence in their home countries,” she said. "Only to come to this country and have this happen to them."

Word of the Hutto facility investigation reached Washington D.C., and officials in the case tell News 8 that President Obama was briefed regarding all of the charges against Dunn.

Dunn has been charged with three counts of official oppression and two counts of unlawful restraint. If convicted, he faces up to one year in jail.

ACLU Investigates Sexual Abuse at Hutto

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 20, 2010
11:23 AM

CONTACT: ACLU
Will Matthews, (212) 549-2582 or 2666; media@aclu.org

Sexual Abuse Of Female Detainees At Hutto Highlights Ongoing Failure Of Immigration Detention System, Says ACLU

NEW YORK - August 20 - A Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) employee at the T. Don Hutto immigration detention facility in Taylor, TX today was charged with sexually abusing numerous female immigration detainees. Donald Charles Dunn, a resident supervisor at the Hutto facility, is accused of abusing the detainees as he was transporting them to the airport after they had been released on bond and has allegedly admitted to telling the women that he was going to "frisk" them before touching their breasts and genital areas for his gratification, according to Sheriff's officials in Williamson County, TX. Dunn is charged with official oppression and unlawful restraint.

The American Civil Liberties Union is actively investigating the sexual abuse of female detainees at Hutto, where the detention of families was halted last year after the successful settlement of an ACLU lawsuit charging that children were being imprisoned in inhumane conditions while their parents awaited immigration decisions.

As part of its investigation, the ACLU has obtained via the Texas Public Information Act copies of both the Intergovernmental Services Agreement (IGSA) between Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), CCA and Williamson County, under which the Hutto facility is operated, and ICE's own transport policy. Both documents are being made available to the public and can be found online at: www.aclu.org/huttodocs. The opportunity for abuse was the result of a failure by CCA officials to abide by the IGSA that female immigration detainees not be isolated with male staff members.

The following can be attributed to Vanita Gupta, Deputy Legal Director of the ACLU:

"The sexual abuse of numerous immigration detainees at Hutto underscores the systemic failures that continue to plague our nation's broken immigration detention system. The irony is that ICE touts Hutto as a flagship facility, emblematic of its commitment to reform. Clearly, that commitment is shallow. ICE has ignored repeated calls for increased and independent oversight and accountability of its immigration detention facilities and the private contractors like CCA who run them, and tragedies like this are the unfortunate result. It is time for ICE officials to live up to their promise of creating a ‘truly civil' immigration detention system that does not tolerate the abuse and degradation of its detainees."

The following can be attributed to Lisa Graybill, Legal Director of the ACLU of Texas:

"It is long past time to close the book on ICE's relationship with CCA. If this administration is serious about reform, it cannot continue to spend millions of taxpayer dollars every month on a private contractor that has proven over and again it is demonstrably incapable of running a safe and humane facility. Immigrant women, many of whom who have fled to the United States seeking refuge from sexual violence, should not fear more of the same in the hands of ICE and its contractors. Zero tolerance starts at the top. The only way for ICE to restore integrity to its system is to immediately sever its contract with CCA and begin a new era of transparency and accountability."

KXAN: Eight Victims ID'd in Hutto Guard Case

Eight victims ID'd in Hutto guard case
Tensions mounting between facility, county

Updated: Friday, 20 Aug 2010, 5:22 PM CDT
Published : Friday, 20 Aug 2010, 9:21 AM CDT

Jackie Vega
TAYLOR, Texas (KXAN) - Williamson County authorities said Friday that eight victims had been identified in connection with a former transport officer at the T. Don Hutto immigration detention facility , who police say groped several women he was supposed to be taking to airports and bus stations.

No sexual assault charges have been filed, however -- although Williamson County officials said they may be later on.

Currently, Donald Charles Dunn, 30, faces three charges of official oppression and two charges of unlawful restraint in connection with five victims police said were molested in Williamson County.

Charges have not yet been filed in connection with three more victims authorities said were attacked in Travis County.

President Obama and Congressional members have been briefed on this case because of its association with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.

Nineteen women have been interviewed so far, from Texas to Florida to Washington D.C., and another 11 still could be victims -- though they haven't been located. In his year of employment at the Taylor facility, Dunn transported 72 people from the facility - where they were being bonded out -- to airports or bus stations, so they could wait for their immigration hearings in locations near family or friends or employment.

Thirty of the people he transported were women.

Williamson County officials said that they were tightening their grip over the facility being run by the Corrections Corporation of America after it was discovered during the investigation that Dunn was not supposed to be transporting those women alone -- but that the facility was required, for the women's safety, to have two officers on board the vehicle with the detainees.

CCA is a private, for-profit company that runs jail and detention facilities, and has come under fire for cutting corners.

Dunn was arrested in Austin Thursday after police said he admitted stopping the van during the early morning trips, at locations in Williamson and Travis counties, and touching them inappropriately for his own "self gratification."

Dunn, a resident supervisor at the facility and employee of Correction Corporation of America, told officers that on these trips, "he told the women he was going to 'frisk' them and then inappropriately touched their breasts, crotch and buttocks," according to a news release by the Williamson County Sheriff's Office.

"Mr. Dunn indicated to Detectives that he had done this to numerous other women while performing his duties as a transport officer," the release said.

Dunn told officers he had done this with several women, while he was transporting them late at night, and would stop at several locations in Williamson and Travis counties to abuse them on the way to Austin Bergstrom International Airport.

The women were being given the rides to the airport and bus stations as a courtesy while they were out on bond, awaiting immigration hearings.

The first report came on May 11 when Austin police told Williamson County Sheriff's deputies that a woman had alerted an airport official that she had been abused on the way to the airport from the facility in Taylor. That's when detectives met with Dunn and listened to his description of groping "numerous women" while doing his duties as a transport officer.

"A large scale investigation into the current locations of other possible victims began immediately after Mr. Dunn’s interview," the news release said. "Detectives from Williamson County and Immigration and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Office of Professional Responsibility/San Antonio) set out to make contact with several of the possible victims, who had located across the country since bonding out of the facility.

"Mr. Dunn was subsequently terminated from his contract employment with Correction Corporation of America when the allegation was first reported to authorities."

The investigation revealed that all of the possible victims of Dunn had been released on bond from the facility and were being transported to the Austin-Bergstrom Airport or bus station when the attacks occurred.

It was during these "courtesy transports" that Dunn would stop at different locations in the areas of both Travis and Williamson County.

Three women said they'd been inappropriately touched.Two of those victims said they were taken against their will to a location near a convenience store, during which one woman said she thought she'd either be killed or raped.

"Several (other) women who were interviewed denied any contact with Mr. Dunn," the statement read. "Some of those advised that they were transported in the daylight hours and or it was raining. Several women could not be located for questioning because of out of date addresses with Immigration and Customs Enforcement."

Dunn was arrested Thursday around 5 p.m. and posted bail on a $35,000 bond Friday.

The investigation is still ongoing at this time. Anyone having information about a victim or Dunn’s crimes is encouraged

Former CCA Guard Charged in Sexual Abuse of Detained Women

This week, the Williamson County police announced that they were formally charging Donald Charles Dunn, aged 30, with two counts of official oppression and three counts of unlawful restraint. These charges from from five incidents involving women detained at the T. Don Hutto Detention Center in Taylor, Texas.

The abuses occurred when Dunn transported women from Hutto to the bus station or airport. Despite the fact that male guards are never to be alone with female detainees, Dunn transported women from Hutto frequently.

ICE has been investigating these abuses since May, and Thursday's charges were the first to be filed.

ICE has trumpeted Hutto as a "model civil detention facility" on its website. The scope of these charges reveals, we hope, that detention places noncitizens in inherently vulnerable positions, allowing any number of officials to take advantage of them.

These problems cannot be solved until detainees are released from detention, and the immigration system is transformed into the civil administrative process it was intended to be.

Taylor Daily Press: Vigil for detained families

Posted: Wednesday, August 11, 2010 1:00 am
Tricia Rosetty | 1 comment

In a field outside of the T. Don Hutto detention facility, about 70 people gather in 100-degree weather. Sweat drips onto their poster board signs – signs that read “Dignity not detention” and “Immigrant civil human rights.” The peaceful gathering, one of more than two dozen over the last four years, commemorates significant change at the facility; namely, the one-year anniversary of changing policy to not detain families at the former prison, though women and children are still held.

According to organizer and president of Taylor’s chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) José Orta, the vast majority of attendees at this weekend’s vigil were just people who care about the issue of immigrant detention, not those that know people in the facility. In fact, the group included people from as far away as San Antonio and the Rio Grande Valley. The display of solidarity at the first vigil to be held this year was important.

“The biggest problem in the community is the apathy that happens,” Orta said. “People become apathetic to this cause. They don’t see it as an issue that touches them, but then when it does they’re surprised that these measures have become so draconian.”

The T. Don Hutto facility has been run by the Corrections Corporation of America and faced two allegations of sexual assault by CCA guards in the last three years, casting uncertainty about the private company’s management. Grassroots organizations across the country have focused on reform at this and similar facilities.

“I thought it was really powerful for people to get together and express their feelings about detention reform. I think people have been pretty disappointed that there haven’t been more reforms,” said Bob Libal, Texas campaign coordinator for Grassroots Leadership, the umbrella organization for Texans United for Families. TUFF, a group fighting to bring attention to immigrant rights, emerged from the vigils at T. Don Hutto, said Orta. In addition to sharing their perspective on the importance of the issue, those in attendance marched with signs and chanted together for over an hour.

“The good thing about chanting and using a microphone is that it creates an echo. We were just hoping that the detainees could hear us,” said Orta, noting that a view from the entrance was blocked when the event began. While the detainees may not have been able to see their supporters, the importance of the issue to those present was clear.

“Being in the country illegally is a civil matter, not a criminal matter,” said Orta. He said that the model of using detention facilities is not the answer because it uses a criminal justice mindset to address a civil issue – a model he fears will be emulated at other sites. Orta suggested that house arrest or even ankle bracelets would be preferable to detention at a facility like T. Don Hutto.

“If you feel they don’t deserve to be here, send them back. Don’t keep them here for months as a form of punishment as if they’ve done something criminal,” said Orta, noting that many individuals who are in the country illegally are seeking amnesty from dangerous situations in their home country. “Just because these people are not citizens, doesn’t mean they don’t deserve to be heard.”

Orta suggested that a federally run program would provide accountability that privatization does not and simplify transparency.

“Our immigration system is broken and we need to fix it. Detention like this for long periods of time is not the answer,” said Orta. “There has to be some kind of reform because this detention is not giving us any sense of goodwill throughout the world, and that’s not the way our country should be seen.”

Logistics: Directions + Caravan Information for August 7 Vigil

For those travelling from Austin, please meet up with others at the offices of PODER, 2604 E. Cesar Chavez, Austin, Tx at 5:30pm, Saturday, August 7, 2010.

For those travelling from elsewhere...

From Georgetown.

From Austin.

From San Antonio.

From Houston.

From Dallas:

Your city not listed? Have questions? Email Bob Libal at boblibal at grassrootsleadership dot org.

Vigil Marks 1 Year Anniversary of ICE's Reform + Family Release Announcement

Dignity not Detention Vigil:

No more Arizonas! No more Huttos!

Saturday, August 7^th @ 7:00 PM

T. Don Hutto Detention Center, 1001 Welch St, Taylor, TX

Please join Texans United for Families, Grassroots Leadership, and organizers from across Texas for a vigil to draw attention to the nation's unaccountable and out-of-control detention system. The vigil will mark the one-year anniversary of Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) announced detention reform and the end of family detention at Hutto. ICE currently heralds Hutto as a model detention center despite the recent revelation in May that a CCA guard was accused of sexually assaulting several women detained at this 500-bed facility. Texas holds 10,000 beds in detention centers to date, with plans for continued expansion. In light of this news, we question ICE's characterization of its detention system as "civilized" and its definition of “reform.” Furthermore, the growing enforcement of immigration laws by local law enforcement as well as anti-immigrant legislation such as Arizona's SB 1070 will increase the detention of all immigrants. The arbitrary nature in which immigrants are shuttled between detention centers almost guarantees that Arizona's detainees will be sent to Texas, including the Hutto detention center, where their human rights will continue to be jeopardized.

Please join us to call for Dignity, not Detention for immigrants. For more information, please email: blibal@grassrootsleadership.org.

UT Immigration Clinic Still At It!

Hutto no longer holds families, we're still happy to say, but now there are around 500 women held there. As the Daily Texan reports,

While struggling to attain asylum, hundreds of immigrant women are kept behind chain-link fences within a former medium security prison, no more than an hour away from the state Capitol.

A review of detention centers released on Oct. 6 by Dora Schriro, the former director of the U.S. Office of Detention Policy and Planning, made recommendations for detention centers. Janet Napolitano, U.S. Department of Homeland Security secretary, announced reforms for facilities soon after.

According to one reform, the center, which released the last family on Sept. 17, would detain women only. It has worked toward consolidating the female populations from three other facilities: Willacy, Pearsall and Port Isabel.

“Many of the settlement’s improvements that we achieved we hope will be continued to be maintained for the women, but the government is not bound by any settlement agreement,” Hines said.
UT law student Ruth Rosenthal works at the clinic and has visited the center with former UT law student — and current attorney for American Gateways — Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch, who also worked at the clinic.

Rosenthal provided counsel for 25 women and assisted a woman from El Salvador, resulting in the reduction of her bond at the center and subsequent release in October. “She had a really good asylum claim. Also, at Hutto she developed numerous medical conditions,” Rosenthal said. “There were a lot of humanitarian concerns that compelled her release at Hutto.”

Pruneda said facilities have arrangements with nearby medical centers to provide health care if specific services needed are not available at the facility. The facility maintains a population of 512 and remains substantially full,Lincoln-Goldfinch said. She said the facility has remained true to the settlement, giving it “a residential feel, rather than a correctional feel,” but policies dictating the retention of detainees may require reformation.

“[Detainees] should be paroled out as soon as they pass a credible fear interview,” Lincoln-Goldfinch said. “You have to show you have been persecuted in the past or [have] a well-founded fear of future persecution based on race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a social group.”

Pruneda said the average stay for detainees nationwide is 31 days. However, Lincoln-Goldfinch said some women may end up staying six to nine months “because their cases are a bit different.”

Lincoln-Goldfinch said alternatives, such as probation or an ankle-bracelet program, are a more cost-effective means of monitoring illegal immigrants.

“I would hope at some point there would be no Hutto facility in the sense that people would be released into the community more regularly and the government would explore alternatives to detention,” Hines said. “There are other means to ensure immigrants appear at their hearings, which is the rationale the government makes for detaining them in the first place.”

Vigil to close Raymondville's Tent City

Vigil to Close "Tent City" Detention Center in Raymondville, Texas


Friday, October 16th, 5:00-7:00pm

The Willacy County Detention Center in Raymondville is the nation's largest and one of its most notorious immigrant detention centers. The prison holds 3,000 immigrant detainees, including 2,000 people in a series of Kevlar tents, earning the facility the designation "Tent City." The facility has been racked by a series of allegations of horrendous conditions and abuse, including alleged sexual assaults on female detainees by guards, reports of detainees being fed rotten and inadequate food, and poor access to medical and mental health care. The facility is operated by private prison corporation Management and Training Corporation. Raymondville is the seat of Willacy County which borders Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico and is the 12th poorest county in the US.

The Raymondville detention center is one of two large immigrant detention centers in the Rio Grande Valley. Detainees at the other facility, the Port Isabel Detention Center, continue a rolling hunger-strike in protest of prolonged detention and detention center conditions. Please join Southwest Workers Union, Grassroots Leadership, Texans United for Families, Austin Tan Cerca de la Frontera, and concerned residents from across Texas in a vigil to launch a campaign to close Tent City and call for increased accountability in ICE's massive detention system.

For more information or directions, please contact Anayanse Garza with Southwest Workers Union at (956) 207-2571. A caravan will be leaving the Austin on Friday morning at 10:00am. For more information or to reserve for a place in the van from Austin, please contact Bob Libal with Grassroots Leadership at blibal@grassrootsleadership.org or (512) 971-0487.

ICE moves women from other Texas facilities to Hutto

Today ICE announced more specific changes, following up on their August 6 announcement that Hutto would no longer detain families. With the last families leaving Hutto in September, the facility now holds only women. And now, it appears that Hutto will be a central detention center for women in Texas, as women are transferred there from Pearsall, Port Isabel, and Willacy (Raymondville).

By all accounts, the improvements made to Hutto following the ACLU's 2007 lawsuit make Hutto highly preferable to Pearsall, Port Isabel, and Willacy, where sexual assault and abuse allegations have repeatedly surfaced. Little has been done by ICE or the contracting corporations to address sexual abuse.

These changes are announced as ICE releases Dora Schriro's comprehensive study of the immigration detention system. More on that forthcoming, but a brief look reveals a deep concern for the expense of using private contractors, the inappropriateness of carceral forms of detention for non-violent detainees, and massive administrative disorganization.

Read ICE's fact sheet.
Read the full report on ICE's detention center.

**Last Families Leave Hutto**

Good news! Long before any of us expected, ICE has released (or deported) the last families from T. Don Hutto. The facility will now be filled with noncriminal immigrant women. Here's what the Associated Press had to say about it:

The last immigrant families have departed a disparaged former Texas prison that housed them while they awaited decisions in their immigration cases, officials said on Friday.

The families have been deported, paroled or released while they pursue asylum or another immigration status to remain in the U.S., Immigration and Customs Enforcement said in a statement. Less than two dozen children and adults remained at the T. Don Hutto facility in Taylor last week and the last four families left by Thursday.

But please keep in mind that the struggle to reform the detention system is not over. As the New York Times editorialized this weekend,

On Friday, her last day on the job, Ms. Schriro delivered a report on the detention system to Janet Napolitano, the homeland security secretary. We hope that it fully reflects the desperate reality: the brutal mistreatment; isolation, filth and deprivation; the shabby or nonexistent health care and the ill and injured detainees who languished and sometimes died, their suffering untreated.

Ms. Schriro’s successor will have a big job in fulfilling the administration’s promise of reform. The abuse and neglect must end. The system must also become much more discriminating about whom it holds — dangerous criminals, not the harmless and sick.

It will also have to rein in the private for-profit prisons that deliver brutal service on the cheap. And it will have to increase accountability and transparency. Ms. Napolitano can start by releasing Ms. Schriro’s report. Americans need to find out what happened in Basile, La., where detainees staged a hunger strike to protest detestable conditions, or downtown Los Angeles, where inmates filed a lawsuit to protest the squalor.

While Ms. Napolitano and her team promise to make detention a “truly civil” system, they show no interest in reforming the corrupt mechanisms that feed it. Instead, they are expanding the programs that have allowed corrupt local officials to round up thousands in unjust raids. The same people whom President Obama has promised a decent shot at citizenship remain easy prey to racial profiling, and are terrified of ending up in this truly uncivilized system. Mr. Obama and Ms. Napolitano must resolve that fundamental contradiction.

Hutto was just the beginning. If you were enraged by the imprisonment of children, that was only the tip of the iceberg. Keep checking this blog for updates on what comes next.

AP: As detention center shuts down in Texas, advocates worry about future for immigrant families

As detention center shuts down in Texas, advocates worry about future for immigrant families

ANABELLE GARAYAssociated Press Writer

6:31 p.m. EDT, September 9, 2009

DALLAS (AP) — As immigrant children and their parents depart a disparaged former Texas prison that housed them while they awaited decisions in their immigration cases, advocates are questioning if the government has fully thought out what happens to the families now.

Federal officials announced last month that the T. Don Hutto facility in Taylor would no longer hold immigrant families and they instead would be detained at the much smaller Berks Family Residential Center in Leesport, Pa. But with only 84 beds — and more than 100 people once housed at Hutto — some advocates wonder if there will be enough space, or if immigrants will be released.

"We still have a lot of questions and would like to hear more details," said Denise Gilman, of the Immigration Clinic at the University of Texas School of Law, which along with other advocates filed a lawsuit contending that family detention at Hutto was inhumane.

Hutto is set to stop holding immigrant families by the end of the year, government officials say, and families have slowly been leaving. Instead of transferring the families to Berks, the government has been trying to process the cases of families at both facilities.

The Texas facility went from holding 127 men, women and children last month to just 22 people this week. They were either deported to their home countries or released while they pursue asylum or another immigration status to remain in the U.S.

As the change takes place, advocates are watching to see if thePennsylvania facility has better conditions, if cases are handled fairly and if new problems arise because of the shift.

Hutto opened as a family detention center in 2006, ending a so-called "catch and release" practice that had permitted families to remain free while their immigration cases were settled. The facility was necessary, ICE officials maintained, because many never showed up in court or some borrowed other people's children and posed as families to avoid detention.

But the facility quickly drew criticism, and The American Civil Liberties Union and other advocates sued the government in 2007 over the detention facility's conditions.

Attorneys and UT law students visiting Hutto to assist detainees with their immigration cases were astonished by the prison-like setting and regimen. Children wore drab prison scrubs. Razor wire encircled the site. They lived in tiny cells furnished with bunk beds and a steel toilet and were subjected to head counts several times a day. Guards with the for-profit Corrections Corporation of America trained to detain criminal adults were overseeing children. Parents said guards disciplined children with threats of being separated from their family.

The Berks facility, by contrast, is a former nursing home and with a reputation among attorneys for being more family friendly. Younger children stay with their parents, while teenagers sleep in separate rooms. One former resident told The Associated Press adults and children went on field trips during her stay, refrigerators in the hallways were stocked with fruit and juice and an interfaith prayer group is available. But still, the stays can be far from smooth.

The resident, who spoke on condition of anonymity because she fears for her safety after fleeing cartel violence in Mexico, said at the border, officials had told her and her American husband she would only be detained for a week at most. But when she arrived, there were families who had been at the facility for a year, longer than the typical stay of a month at Hutto. Some residents had waited for a month or two before being interviewed by an asylum officer.

"That's when I said to myself 'So what awaits me?'" said the Mexican woman, who has since been released on humanitarian parole after a month at Berks and has petitioned to remain in the country since she's married to a U.S. citizen.

Going forward, families arriving at the U.S. border and entry points seeking asylum or trying to immigrate will be taken to Berks if the government believes they will disappear instead of showing up to immigration court, said Dora Schriro, who has been heading up the new Office of Detention Policy and Planning at the Department of Homeland Security. Other families will be released and placed on some type of community supervision, Schriro said.

The families at Hutto will likely be deported or receive some type of immigration benefit, such as asylum or parole, allowing them to remain in the U.S. before Hutto closes, she said.

Schriro will leave her new post mending of the nation's immigration detention system to be commissioner of correction for New York City, leaving advocates with questions over how that will affect the upcoming changes.

For now, advocates for immigrant families say they will be watching to see if Berks detainees can access legal representation. About one-third of asylum seekers before the court that handles Berks' cases did not have an attorney, while a majority at Hutto did, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. Having an attorney boosts people's chances of remaining in the country.

They also worry there could be some unintended consequences in the switch, especially when it comes to distance. Berks is located thousands of miles from the border crossings in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas used by most of the detainees and some question whether the government will be able to quickly and humanely transport such families to Pennsylvania.

"What happens to a family arrested in Texas or who goes to the border ... and asks for asylum? Will those people be released?" asked Barbara Hines, director of the Immigration Clinic at UT Law School. "To send them all the way to Berks if they're going to be released anyway seems like a waste of resources to me."

The Economist: When Home Is Prison

The venerable neoliberal rag, the Economist, covered changes in US immigration detention policy, as well, though it mostly summarizes previous reports/posts. Correction, however: Napolitano has NOT scaled by immigration enforcement compared to Chertoff. Instead, she has expanded the 287(g) program, which allows local police to enforce immigration law, to a host of new cities, many of them in Texas. 287(g) has been discredited as institutionalized racial profiling.

WHEN HOME IS PRISON
Aug 13th 2009

Slow improvements in the processing of immigrants
...
[Janet Napolitano's] department has already made changes. The administration has scaled back the workplace raids that were so controversial during the Bush
years. It is opting instead to focus on auditing employers and
expanding E-Verify, an electronic system that lets employers check the
immigration status of potential employees.

But the biggest shift concerns family detention. In 2006 George Bush
said he would end a policy known as "catch and release", whereby
illegal immigrants were allowed to go free after being caught because
so many of them failed to turn up for subsequent court proceedings. But
detaining children and families proved more delicate than holding lone
adults. Later that year, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
opened a facility specifically for families in Taylor, a small town
north of Austin.

The T. Don Hutto Family Residential Centre was formerly a
medium-security prison. In its new incarnation it is still run by the
Corrections Corporation of America, a private prison company. And
inside, Hutto used to be just like a jail. Barbara Hines, director of
the Immigration Clinic at the University of Texas's law school, says
that she was shocked when she started visiting: children were wearing
prison uniforms and the parents were depressed and desperate. Everyone
was cooped up in cells for most of the day, and the children had only
an hour or so of lessons.

In March 2007 the Immigration Clinic and the American Civil Liberties
Union sued Michael Chertoff, then the head of the Department of
Homeland Security, over the conditions at Hutto. In August that year
the parties settled, with the government agreeing to a list of reforms.
That agreement was set to expire later this month, but on August 6th
ICE announced an overhaul of America's approach to detention. As
immediate steps, the government would put monitors in many of the adult
facilities, and immediately stop detaining families at Hutto.

The announcement raises questions. For one thing, it is not clear
where the families are going to go. ICE said that it would move them to
the Berks Family Residential Centre in Pennsylvania, but that facility
is full. And although Berks is somewhat nicer than Hutto,
immigrants'-rights groups are still sceptical about keeping children in
detention at all.

Planning large-scale reform next year may still be too ambitious: it is
an election year, which makes politicians even more skittish about
controversy. But some reform advocates are more optimistic: at least,
reckons Charles Foster, an immigration lawyer in Houston, immigration
reform is still on the agenda.

ACLU: Hutto Settlement Extended

ACLU Strikes Deal To Continue Humane Conditions At Hutto Detention Center
(8/7/2009; Updated 8/10/2009)

Agreement Will Remain In Place Until All Families Have Been Released

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org

NEW YORK – The American Civil Liberties Union and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials today struck a deal to extend an agreement requiring ICE to maintain improvements in the conditions at the T. Don Hutto family detention center in Texas and submit to external oversight until the last family is released from the facility.

The deal comes on the heels of an announcement Thursday that the government will immediately begin ending the detention of families at Hutto, the focus of 2007 lawsuits filed by the ACLU charging that children were being illegally imprisoned under inhumane conditions. The last family is expected to be released from Hutto no later than the end of the year.

"No young child should ever have to endure imprisonment in an adult prison," said Vanita Gupta, staff attorney with the ACLU Racial Justice Program and a lead attorney in the Hutto litigation. "Now that the long-overdue decision has been made to end the detention of families at Hutto, the government is to be commended for wanting to ensure that the improvements in the facility's conditions that have been made during the past two years remain in place until there are no families left there."

The ACLU's lawsuits were filed on behalf of 26 immigrant children between the ages of one and 17 detained with their parents who, in almost all cases, were seeking asylum. A settlement agreement reached several months after the lawsuits were filed mandates, among a number of other things, that children be given expanded educational programming and increased recreation time outdoors. The agreement was set to expire August 29.

The decision to end family detention at Hutto was made as part of a broad government plan to improve the immigration detention system. According to the plan, officials will work to consolidate many detainees in facilities with conditions that reflect their status as non-criminals, establish more centralized authority over the system and create more direct oversight of detention centers.

The plan also calls for ICE to stop sending families to Hutto, and to relocate the remaining 127 detainees there. Some will be transferred to an 84-bed facility in Pennsylvania, while others will be considered for programs that do not require detention, such as home and electronic monitoring.

Attorneys involved in the Hutto litigation include Gupta of the ACLU's Racial Justice Program; Judy Rabinovitz of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project; Lisa Graybill of the ACLU Foundation of Texas; and Barbara Hines of the University of Texas School of Law Immigration Clinic.

A copy of the stipulation is available online.

Additional information about the ACLU's Hutto litigation is available online at.

Michelle Brané: Good News on Immigration Detention But Keeping the Pressure On

We're blogging our fingers off, but here's an excellent post from long-time family and child advocate, Michelle Brané, posted at the Huffington Post:

Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) announcement this week that they will stop detaining families at the T. Don Hutto Residential Center in Taylor, Texas, is terrific news. When I first visited the facility, which is a former prison, in December of 2006 I was shocked at what I saw -- kids getting only one hour of school a day, terribly inadequate medical care, insufficient time to eat, and, worst of all, inappropriately severe discipline. (See my report: Locking Up Family Values: The Detention of Immigrant Families.)

The facility was part of the Bush administration's plan to end what they called "catch and release." That administration gave the impression that families were swarming across the border and that smugglers were using babies as "mules" to prevent the detention of their clients. But they were never able to fill Hutto and they never to my knowledge identified a trafficked child through the new process.

What I saw at the facility were families -- mostly women, many of them pregnant, most with very young children -- who were fleeing to the United States for protection. The trek north through the desert is extremely dangerous and difficult. Many die on the journey. This is not a trip you make with your young children unless you are desperate. It also doesn't make sense to bring your toddler with you if you sole intention is to work illegally. It was clear from speaking with these women that they had real fears and valid claims to asylum.

But at Hutto they were treated as criminals, and their children were punished as well. Families slept in actual jail cells -- with prison cots and toilets in the cells. Children had some toys in the common areas but were not allowed to take anything into their cells at night. One family told me about a six-year-old child who cried when a prison guard told him he could not take the picture he had drawn into his cell. The guard yelled at him for crying, and the child's father tried to intervene. As punishment, the child and his father were separated -- to different wings of the facility -- for three days!

Following our report and the ensuing media attention and an ALCU lawsuit, the facility underwent improvements -- including providing education for the children, recreation opportunities, freedom of movement -- but family detention standards that were implemented are entirely inappropriate and still do not address issues of discipline and common decency. I couldn't be happier that families will no longer be placed in this facility. And the administration's decision is a clear indication that they are taking steps in the right direction.

I am worried though. Because the administration has made it clear that they will continue to detain families at another facility I have visited many times. The Berks County Family Shelter Care facility in Leesburg, Pennsylvania. That facility is not as blatantly disturbing as Hutto. It is a former nursing home -- not a prison. But the term "shelter" is still misleading. In 2006, I met families that had been detained there for two years. Children over five are separated from their parents at night. The same sort of disciplinary issues I mentioned above exist at Berks, too. The administration has indicated that they will be looking into alternatives to detention. I hope they mean it and I hope they do it quickly.

Advocates for immigrant rights are losing patience. The administration has been reviewing the system for six months and saying that they understand that the current criminal model of immigration detention is inappropriate for civil detainees. But they have also made it clear in statements and through their actions that they will continue aggressive enforcement operations and that they expect the detained population to grow. That means that some 440,000 immigrants and asylum-seekers are expected to be detained in the U.S. this year. We need to be realistic. We need immigration reform and that has to come from Congress.

Our current laws are unforgiving and unrealistic. We also need to be patient and give the administration time to overhaul a detention system that is a mess. I am not saying we should give them a free pass -- but my interaction with ICE headquarters since the change in administration has been positive. I think they are sincere in their desire to make the system more humane. We have no choice. We have to take a big of a leap of faith -- both sides, and work together. We can still hold them accountable -- especially if we don't see improvement. The announcement to stop using Hutto for families is the administration's attempt to show us they mean it and are trying. The former administration had been planning to increase family detention space with a request for proposals for up to three new facilities. This week, we went from fearing an increase to a cut in family bed space of 75 percent. That is pretty good.

The Obama administration has a lot more work to do to demonstrate that they mean what they say. For now, we have to trust that and do what we can to help them implement change while still holding them accountable.

Berks County Family Center full

The Reading Eagle reports that Berks County officials were unaware of ICE's policy change, and have no room for families transferred from Texas:

Federal officials announced Thursday that they were closing a detention center for immigrant families in Texas and sending the detained families to the Berks Family Shelter Care Facility in the former Berks Heim.

But nobody told Berks County. And the Berks facility is full.

County Commissioner Kevin S. Barnhardt, who is chairman of the county prison board, said he was unaware of the move by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.

Kenneth A. Borkey Jr., executive director of the Bern Township facility, which houses families awaiting immigration hearings, said the center is at capacity.

Immigration officials could not be reached for comment.

In the announcement, they said the closing of the 512-bed T. Don Hutto Family Residential Facility in Taylor, Texas, was the first step in shifting illegal-immigration cases from the criminal to the civil court system.

Officials said they would send detained families to the Berks facility until it was filled and then develop alternative programs, such as supervised release, to monitor families awaiting deportation hearings.

Borkey said he was drafting a memo with the bad news for the immigration agency.

"We have an 84-bed capacity and we are at capacity," Borkey said.

Borkey said he planned to notify county commissioners and consult with immigration officials about reconfiguring the building to make room for more detainee families.

The county, which signed a contract with ICE that became effective Thursday, is reimbursed $197 a day per individual.

Borkey said news of the Texas closing rattled his employees, who feared their jobs also might be in jeopardy.

"At this time the county has not been informed of any changes to our program," Borkey said.

No word yet on whether Hutto's families will, indeed, be transferred or whether ICE will allow the detained family population to shrink gradually.

Practically speaking, it seems preferable to release families on bond, parole, and recognizance and as their claims are processed through immigration courts.

Most families detained at Hutto and Berks are asylum-seeking, and are therefore eligible for various forms of release. In fact, detaining refugees and asylum-seekers in prison-like conditions is generally considered bad policy and against international law, as this can re-traumatize people fleeing persecution, abuse, violence, and torture.

What will happen to the families at Hutto?

Many have been asking us what will happen to the families currently detained at Hutto. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer,

Morton said the process of transferring families from Texas to Pennsylvania would begin immediately.

"For the immediate future we will use Berks to its capacity," Morton said. To the extent that ICE needs more capacity for families, he said, the agency would explore alternatives to detention, including supervised release and electronic monitoring with ankle bracelets.

ICE is not ending family detention policy, but is making use of the more humane of the two facilities and a range of non-detention forms of custody. Despite what critics have argued, this is not a "catch and release" policy, but more like a "catch and follow" policy. Families can expect to be required to call ICE at daily, weekly, or other regular intervals, to have ICE officers visit them at home or work, to be assigned electronic monitoring ankle bracelets, and other forms of supervision. Bond and parole may be used more widely, as well, which requires that families post $4-10,000 for each adult (less for children) to guarantee court appearance.

More News Coverage

Google found 791 articles reporting on ICE' changes to family and immigrant detention policy, but here are just a few. For the most part, we're all waiting for more information. Family detention at Hutto may be ending, but we have few details about how the rampant problems in the detention system as a whole will be addressed. For now, here are some words...

From Houston Chronicle: ICE will revamp detainee system, policy of using converted prisons to hold families of illegal immigrants is on its way out

Three years ago, immigrant families sent to a Central Texas immigration detention center found themselves at a converted prison rimmed in razor wire. Child inmates slept with their parents in cells monitored by lasers, stood still for daily head counts and donned navy detention uniforms available in sizes as small as infant onesies. They reported getting only one hour of school a day and going weeks without playing in the sun.

As word spread about conditions for families at the T. Don Hutto Family Residential Facility, critics pointed to the former medium-security prison as being emblematic of problems associated with the Bush administration's immigration detention practices. ...

The detention centers have been sharply criticized in recent years amid reports of substandard medical care, detainee deaths and poor access to attorneys. Morton said the system will be revamped to get away from a penal detention model that relies heavily on contracts with correctional facilities and private industry. Within the next three to five years, he said, the agency aims to use facilities designed, located and operated specifically for immigration purposes.

“What we're trying to do is design a system that reflects the unique civil detention authorities that we're exercising,” Morton said. “The population that we detain is different than the population that is detained in a traditional prison or jail setting.” ...

Barbara Hines, an attorney who oversees the University of Texas immigration law clinic and was one of the first nonprofit attorneys to visit the Hutto facility, praised ICE's addition of monitors to oversee daily operations at larger immigration facilities.

“Having ICE monitors in prisons is a good step forward because I think in the last couple years, the expansion of detention has gotten out of control, leading to deaths and a lack of medical care,” Hines said. “But I don't think ICE is capable of policing itself.” ...

Morton stressed that ICE is not shying away from immigration detention in general. “We are going to continue to detain people, and we are going to continue to detain people on a large scale,” he said.

From the San Antonio Express-News: Detention overhaul hits Austin area site

Several years ago, the Bush administration hailed the 512-bed Hutto facility as a model center, which was operated under contract by Corrections Corp. of America.

However, a federal lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union forced the Bush administration to make improvements to the former state prison and to make it more family-friendly.

But civil rights groups and immigrant advocacy organizations continued to call conditions at the Texas center deplorable.

“Ending family detention at Hutto is extremely welcome and long overdue,” said Joanne Lin, ACLU legislative counsel.

The ACLU said it would continue to push for reform of the immigration detention system to ensure detainees are given access to due process and not inappropriately locked up for prolonged periods of time.

[what your representatives REALLY think] Congressional Republicans, meanwhile, questioned whether the detention system changes would be a return to the controversial catch-and-release system that was ended by the creation of the detention facilities under the Bush administration.

Alternatives to detention, like supervised release and catch-and-release programs, for immigrants scheduled to be deported do not work, said Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio and the ranking Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, which oversees immigration law.

“I hope that the Obama administration will not repeat past mistakes and return to a policy that puts more illegal immigrants on the streets of American communities,” Smith said.

From the LA Times: Obama aims to overhaul immigration jail system

Pledging more oversight and accountability, the Obama administration announced plans Thursday to transform the nation's immigration detention system from one reliant on a scattered network of local jails and private prisons to a centralized one designed specifically for civil detainees.

The reforms are aimed at establishing greater control over a system that houses about 33,000 detainees a day and that has been sharply criticized as having unsafe and inhumane conditions and as lacking the medical care that may have prevented many of the 90 deaths that have occurred since 2003. ...

Immigrant rights advocates welcomed the changes but said there was still no clear policy on how detention facilities would be penalized if problems were found.

"We are encouraged that the administration is taking a hard look at what has traditionally been a dark spot in our immigration system," said Karen Tumlin, a staff attorney at the Los Angeles-based National Immigration Law Center. "However, only time will tell if the reforms announced today amount to lasting change or simply creative repackaging of prior policies."

Tumlin and others said the detention standards needed to be made legally binding to guarantee immigrants access to counseling, family visits, legal materials and recreation time. Legislation has been introduced aimed at accomplishing this.

Advocates also said that the government should use less punitive and less costly alternatives to detention, such as ankle bracelets or intensive supervision, for certain immigrants.

"We are very disappointed by the failure to discuss alternatives to detention in the proposal," said Ahilan Arulanantham, an attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. "The system now detains thousands of people who are not a danger and not a flight risk."

To increase oversight, the immigration agency would place federal monitors in 23 large facilities, which house more than 40% of the detainees. The agency also plans to hire experts in healthcare administration and detention management, and someone to review medical complaints.

"We need a system that is open, transparent and accountable," Morton said.

A crackdown on illegal immigrants under the George W. Bush administration led to a dramatic increase in the detainee population, from 19,700 in fiscal year 2006 to 33,400 today. The budget for detention and deportation is nearly $2.5 billion, much of which is spent on contracts with private prison companies such as Corrections Corp. of America.

Morton said the agency did not plan to reduce the number of detainees or stop contracting with local governments and private corporations. But he said his staff would assess where detainees should be housed.

He said that many -- including some asylum seekers and those without criminal records waiting to be deported -- should be in facilities less restrictive than jails and prisons.