Detention centers, religious leaders, immigrants and asylees ((trip to Laredo TX, part 2)

Part 2:  Sun July 8

Photos from the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas. This is the largest family detention center in the US, with room for 2400 detainees. ‘Family residential’ is basically a euphemism for the detention of women and children. We were not allowed to enter (we did not expect to). One of the leaders of our group, however, is an immigration attorney who has various clients who have claimed asylum status and are now detained at Dilley. Mothers and children are detained together while they await their hearings to determine if they meet the criteria for asylum.

The attorney in our group noted that increasingly, these hearings take place by video, with the asylum seeker in the detention center, the judge in another location, the attorneys in yet additional locations, and translators on the phone. She suggested that the overall effect of this is that the hearings are chaotic and the judges are then less inclined to regard the asylum seekers as trustworthy - and as a result, people who clearly meet the criteria for asylum in her opinion are less likely to be successful in their hearings.

She also noted that most of the large detention facilities are managed by for-profit companies. Dilley is managed by CoreCivic, until recently known as CCA (Corrections Corporation of America). We also briefly visited another detention facility managed by Geo, another for-profit prison management company. We noted various difficulties of the for-profit prison system, including that prison management is incentivized to maximize profits by reducing the cost of detainee/prisoner care. The security and safety record of these private prisons is frankly terrible. In mid-2016, the Justice Department determined that all contracts with for-profit prisons would be concluded because they did not provide the level of security and safety as the Department of Corrections’ own prisons. After the presidential election, however, the attorney general reversed this decision. (Google ‘Geo Group’ for more info about this.) (This episode is a reminder that, from the perspective of the people we have been speaking with, the US immigration system has been terribly broken for many decades, and no one should think that problems began with the current administration (though the current administration has adopted many policies that seem particularly heartless). Dilley was built under the previous administration, and the dramatic expansion of for-profit prisons also took place under previous administrations.)

==========================================================================

Bishop James Tomayo, Bishop of the Diocese of Laredo, joined our group for Shaharit /morning prayers yesterday morning and at various points throughout our visit..He was one of the many religious leaders we met who are working hard to care for the residents of this region. Bishop Tomayo showed us the coat of arms of the Diocese of Laredo, which has an image of a river running through it - echoing the Rio Grande that separates the twin cities of Laredo, Texas, and Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. 

across the border from Laredo TX to Nuevo Laredo Mexico