Pro-immigration organizers gathered at the U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement (ICE) Detention Facility in Adelanto on Thursday July 9 to show support for detained immigrants and demonstrate opposition against further expansion of the prison.
The prayer vigil saw organizers from the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California (ACLU), the Justice for Immigrants Coalition of Southern California (JFIC), Inland Empire-Immigrant Youth Coalition (IEIYC), and other affiliated organizations gather outside of the faciltiy to display solidarity with detainees through prayer and song.
On July 1, the GEO group–the multinational corporation that operates the prison–announced a 640 bed expansion and began further intake of immigrant detainees, some of which are now women and transgender women. Currently it detains 1,300 men.
“We are very pleased with the successful activation and the start of the intake process at our three company-owned facilities in Oklahoma, Michigan, and California,” said CEO George Zoley. “These important activations are indicative of the continued need for correctional and detention bed space across the United States as well as our company’s ability to provide tailored real estate, management, and programmatic solutions to our diversified customer base.”
Photo/Anthony Victoria
Patricia Suarez of Alhambra has a son who is being detained by ICE officials at the Adelanto Detention Center. “It has been an inferno for me,” Suarez said about her son’s detainment.
Patricia Suarez of Alhambra has a son who is being detained by ICE officials at the Adelanto Detention Center. “It has been an inferno for me,” Suarez said about her son’s detainment.
According to ACLU community engagement and policy advocate Luis Nolasco, the facility has a notorious history of dreadful conditions. There have been two deaths at the prison since its opening in 2011. In April, Salvadoran immigrant Raul Ernesto Morales-Ramos, 44, died after being transferred from Adelanto Detention Center to a hospital in Palmdale, according to a statement from ICE. He had been in custody since 2010.
“The facility has a history of horrible medical care and abusive practices,” explained Nolasco. “Quite frankly we are terrified as to what may happen when there are populations that are very vulnerable detained in there.”
Nolasco said his organization and partners are frustrated at what they perceive as a continual conflict against undocumented immigrants.
“We cannot take it anymore,” he said. “We’re tired of seeing our communities being criminalized and detained.”
Patricia Suarez of Alhambra, whose son has been detained inside Adelanto since February 6 for felony charges, said she will continue to fight for justice for her son and other immigrants looking to live the “American Dream.”
“It has been an inferno for me,” Suarez said about her son’s detainment. “Sitting through court, sitting through the pain. It’s a trauma for all of us who come to the U.S. to work hard. Us mothers, we no longer cry. We are fighting for the rights of our sons and human beings who came here to be big and dream big. I just never imagined living through something so awful.”
Via: http://iecn.com/organizations-hold-vigil-and-demonstration-in-protest-of-prison-expansion/
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