Immigration Advocates Call for Release of Detainees Held in NYC (WNYC)

Immigration Advocates Call for Release of Detainees Held in NYC
by Ailsa Chang

NEW YORK, NY February 01, 2010 —Immigration advocates are demanding the release of immigrant detainees set to be transferred from a Lower Manhattan facility to a New Jersey jail. The Varick Detention facility will close this month, and Benita Jain, co-director of the Immigrant Defense Project, says it's a good time to assess how many of those immigrants really need to be detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

"There are other community-based alternatives to detention where people can check into ICE officers on a regular basis instead of being detained," Jain says.

Federal immigration officials say they're working with Congress to explore alternatives to immigrant detention.

Jain says the New Jersey jail may have some of the same poor conditions immigrants said they suffered at Varick -- such as low temperatures, poor meals, and little access to lawyers.