StemCell Therapy

I called Barahonas dorm immediately after I learned the news. There was one person who tested positive, Barahona said, right away. Its here. Barahonas lawyer from the Southern Poverty Law Center, Diego Snchez, had told him, and Barahona had told the other men in his unit. The news was less a revelation than a confirmation of what the men already expected. Barahonas hands were shaking. The officers hadnt given him his diabetes medicine that evening, he said, and he didnt know if he was shaking because his meds were out of whack or because the news about the virus had sent him into a spiral. Im going to try to calm myself down, he said.

The next day, April 10, the federal judge in Barahonas habeas case held a dial-in hearing, in compliance with court social-distancing rules. In court, the warden said he had implemented additional cleaning measures; he wrote in the affidavit that detainees are repeatedly advised by staff to practice social distancing measures in addition to C.D.C. recommended hand-washing procedures. Unfortunately, he noted, detainees often choose not to follow this protocol.

ICEs assistant field-office director for Atlanta wrote in a separate statement that detainees entering facilities were screened and asked whether theyd had contact with anyone with Covid-19. If they said they had, they were separated from other detainees for 14 days. Hand-cleaner dispensers, he said, had been added to the bathrooms, and the facility was routinely cleaned. (Several detainees in the womens unit told me the dispensers were sometimes empty.)

The judge, Clay D. Land, denied the request for the detainees release. The facility, he wrote, could fix the problems and alleviate any constitutional violations without letting these eight people out. This is a terribly hard loss, Snchez, Barahonas lawyer, told me. Nobody can with any honesty say people there are safe.

Immigration detention is an administrative hold, designed to ensure that people facing deportation dont disappear. Because detained immigrants are held neither as consequence of being charged or convicted of a crime nor on orders of a judge, ICE has vast authority to simply release nearly everyone it holds to grant detainees parole. Even detainees with specific past criminal convictions, whom the agency is required, by statute, to detain after their criminal sentence ends, can be released on humanitarian exigencies. The agency can, if it chooses, find other, noncustodial forms of supervision requiring check-ins with officers, say, or forcing detainees to pay a bond, or attaching an electronic monitor to their ankle. Studies show more than 95 percent of immigrants in these release programs comply.

ICE told me that it continues to encourage facilities to follow C.D.C. guidelines and requires detention centers to comply with a set of federal standards, including plans that address the management of communicable diseases. But just last year, a report by the Department of Homeland Securitys inspector general found egregious violations of detention standards, including for medical care. Inspectors hired to perform a review of Irwin County Detention Center in 2017 wrote that the facility was failing to comply with basic standards, noting, among other things, that the medical area and patient examination tables were filthy.

Barahona had heard on TV news reports that most of the people dying of Covid-19 were either old or had health conditions like his. None of the facility workers had told him anything about how to protect himself, he said. My biggest concern is my son. You know, the deepest wish of my heart is to be able to be with him for as long as he needs me.

View post:
Fear, Illness and Death in ICE Detention: How a Protest Grew on the Inside - The New York Times

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