Pinal County migrant lockups criticized by ACLU (The Arizona Republic)

Pinal County migrant lockups criticized by ACLU
ACLU report assails living conditions, policies at detention center

by Caitlin McGlade - Jun. 24, 2011 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic

The American Civil Liberties Union has released a report decrying living conditions and policies for immigrants held at detention centers in Pinal County.

The ACLU is urging U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to end its contract with the Pinal County Adult Detention Center, citing excessive detention time, inhumane conditions and sparse legal protection for detainees.

The 36-page report documents more than 100 interviews with immigrants behind bars, many of whom have claimed they were held for years without any contact with family and have subsequently developed psychological illnesses.

While awaiting trial proceedings, detainees in Pinal County also complained of no outdoor recreation.

ICE officials said that the report publishes "unverified allegations" and that the ACLU did not offer officials the opportunity to respond to the claims, according to a written statement provided by Vincent Picard, spokesman for the Phoenix ICE office.

"The significant acts of abuse alleged in this report have yet to be formally reported to ICE, the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General or any other law-enforcement agency," the ICE statement said.

Officials will investigate the claims, the statement said.

The Adult Detention Center has had a contract with ICE since 2006. Its conditions are considered the worst of the five centers investigated for the report, said Victoria Lopez, an ACLU attorney who authored the report. All five immigrant-detention centers are in Pinal County, but the other four are not funded by the county.

James Kimble, chief deputy of detention services for the Pinal County Sheriff's Office said the facility averages 1,150 inmates and there were 391 illegal immigrants currently being housed who had been sent from ICE. He said the average detention for an illegal immigrant at the facility is 28 days.

He disputed the report's claim that there was no outdoor recreation facility at the detention center. Kimble said an outdoor facility measuring 100 feet long, 30 feet wide with 11-foot-high walls surrounded by a 12-foot-high chain link fence was built in 2006.

The ACLU report took two years to compile and collected hundreds of grievances.

"This isn't something that just came up," Lopez said. "Many of these problems have been persistent over the course of a number of years. Two years now after detention reforms, we're continuing to hear the same serious types of complaints we heard not just two years ago but even five years ago."

Maurice Goldman, a Tucson-based attorney who specializes in immigration law, said he has witnessed little change regarding consistency among detention centers and accessibility to clients. He has no problem visiting clients at the four centers that are not run by the county. But when he needs to contact a Pinal County Adult Detention Center client, he must give 24 hours' notice and has to do business divided by a fiberglass wall.

The law requires that illegal immigrants should be detained while awaiting trial if they run a high risk of fleeing or pose a danger to the community.

Goldman has represented clients who have posed little danger - such as a man caught riding a bike at night without a light - but he usually can secure bond for them. But then, the problem becomes having a family with an income high enough to afford it, he said.

Only about 10 percent of illegal detainees have lawyers because they are not granted the right to an attorney, according to the ACLU report. Some impoverished detainees can seek free legal advice from the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project, a non-profit that offers assistance to adults and children detained by ICE.

"The system still needs some serious reformations, such as coming up with better alternatives to detaining," Goldman said. "We're still seeing many individuals who should be out in the community but are being held, and it's costing billions of dollars for our government to house them."

"The Pinal County Sheriff's Office is committed to the safety, health and welfare of everyone committed to our facility," Kimble said.