Sounds like some illegal immigrants are learning from the Sheet Heads at Abu Ghraib and Gitmo. Those media hounds sure do like a good story...as opposed to the truth.
Posted on 08/21/2005 6:05:51 PM PDT by Coleus
PATERSON - The explosive issue of whether immigration detainees are being abused in the nation's prisons has flared up at the Passaic County Jail. Sheriff Jerry Speziale ejected federal investigators from the jail last month, accusing them of arrogance and incompetence, his spokesman said Tuesday.
Bill Maer, spokesman for the jail, said the sheriff kicked out the investigators on July 21 after two weeks of inquiry into complaints by immigration detainees of poor conditions and abuse. Maer also dismissed the detainees' allegations of widespread mistreatment at the county jail as cheap ploys to generate media attention.
The federal probe is part of a multistate audit of 10 detention facilities around the nation by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General. The federal agency added Passaic County to the audit in November, after media reports about immigration detainees being terrorized and attacked by dogs.
Meanwhile, detention opponents also have harshly criticized the audit, saying it did not go far enough and that the federal investigators were dismissive of advocates' concerns.
Tamara Faulkner, spokeswoman for the Office of the Inspector General, said in an e-mail that she could not comment because the review was ongoing. The results of the audit are expected in November, she said.
"They're arrogant, they don't know what they are talking about, and they are a disgrace to the federal government," Maer said of the Office of Inspector General investigators. The sheriff's department has threatened to stop housing immigration detainees and has limited the number of detainees it would hold to 192, Maer said.
Investigators ordered jail personnel around, made unfounded accusations and asked the department's Internal Affairs Division to review allegations, Maer said.
Every day, nearly 20,000 immigrants are being held in detention facilities nationwide, at an annual cost of $660 million, said Tim Counts, spokesman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the division of the Department of Homeland Security that oversees immigration detention.
The federal government pays the Passaic County Jail $77 a day for each immigration detainee housed. Last year, the jail earned $17.7 million housing a mix of federal inmates for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Marshals Service, accounting for more than a quarter of the department's budget and nearly 74 percent of its revenues, according to the county budget.
"What is unfortunate to hear is that there is now an impediment to a much-needed investigation to get the truth about what conditions are really like in the jail," said Bryan Lonegan, a Legal Aid attorney who offers free legal advice to detainees. "It's a problem with the way this whole audit has been managed."
The New Jersey Civil Rights Defense Committee, a local human rights group, released a statement Tuesday saying that the federal auditors frequently rebuffed its concerns.
"The OIG has not demonstrated a willingness to seriously investigate the abuses at Passaic County Jail," the statement said.
Jeannette Gabriel, a member of the committee, said the auditors had halved the number of facilities under review nationwide to five, including Passaic County Jail and Hudson County Jail.
Since 2001, when the Passaic County Jail began stepping up its housing of federal immigration detainees and inmates, the jail has been plagued by complaints of overcrowding and unsanitary conditions, racial and anti-immigrant slurs and physical abuse.
Several detainees spoke about conditions they were being held under in July telephone interviews from the county jail.
Sami Al-Shaheen, 36, said that his dorm held 58 men but had only two functioning toilets. Cleaning consisted of jail staff providing the detainees with a half-cup of bleach each day. Men slept on bunks stacked three high. The summer heat and crowding in the jail, which lacks air conditioning, led many of the detainees to suffer breathing problems.
Al-Shaheen said he is being detained because immigration officials accused him of a fake marriage to a U.S. citizen, which he denies.
Ajaj Salah, a Palestinian who has since been moved to a jail in York County, Pa., said, "The officers, they treat us like animals, not like human beings." Salah said he was convicted of insurance fraud before he was detained on immigration violations.
"We live like rats in a hole," said Dennis Ucha Uia of Nigeria. However, he did not blame the guards because they do not control immigration policy. "The guards are all right. They are young men doing their job."
We don't have to do that, of course, but what's wrong with them having that belief?
And, why should we NOT do it for real ??????? We need action on many different fronts to curb this flood, and "mis-treating" those captured is a heck of a place to start !!!!
I don't much like killing people, Fur Shur, but if we put panties on their heads and bring in the barking dogs, it might well work to convince them to abide by our rules.
...The federal probe is part of a multistate audit of 10 detention facilities around the nation by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General. The federal agency added Passaic County to the audit in November, after media reports about immigration detainees ...
Homeland Security is making sure the illegal immigrants are be treated well. I feel safer already.
Sounds like some illegal immigrants are learning from the Sheet Heads at Abu Ghraib and Gitmo. Those media hounds sure do like a good story...as opposed to the truth.
Anyone have a current family tree for the US Goobermint ? Where does the Dept of Homeland Security sit on the trickle down on the authority chain ?
They're a separate cabinet-level department, aren't they?
Equal with Justice? Or subordinate?
Lemme google real quick...
A lot of stuff rolled up under them, the Secret Service, TSA, the Coast Guard, Customs and Border Protection, Citizenship and Immigration Services, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and FEMA.
Link to org chart: http://www.dhs.gov/interweb/assetlibrary/DHSOrgChart.htm
"The Cabinet includes the Vice President and the heads of 15 executive departments-the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Labor, State, Transportation, Treasury, and Veterans Affairs, and the Attorney General. Under President George W. Bush, Cabinet-level rank also has been accorded to the Administrator, Environmental Protection Agency; Director, Office of Management and Budget; the Director, National Drug Control Policy; and the U.S. Trade Representative. "
Link: http://www.whitehouse.gov/government/cabinet.html
Thanks gotta get up to speed on the transition that 9-11 brought upon us......
Some good things have happened, but there's still a lot of ignorance at the top...directors and secretaries haven't a clue what the other departments have done or can do.
One DHS deputy made a hare-brained comment vis-a-vis the Minutemen about DHS not letting civilians take part in the war on terror...which is exactly what the Coast Guard Auxiliary is and does.
It's going to take time that we may not have for them to get their acts together.
Okay, gonna call it a night...my best to you and yours.
Next thing we'll hear is that the "abused prisoners" will be granted their own piece of American land... (sound familiar?)
Sadly most Sheriffs either don't know they have the authority to kick the feds out of their county, or are afraid of losing their federal grant(bribe) money.
We are reaping a very bitter harvest from this massive lawlessness and threat to our culture and sovereignty.
Lawlessness begets lawlessness.
That Texas judge ought to be removed from the bench...and then be made to ride one, tarred and feathered, out of town!
..."What is unfortunate to hear is that there is now an impediment to a much-needed investigation to get the truth about what conditions are really like in the jail," said Bryan Lonegan, a Legal Aid attorney who offers free legal advice to detainees. "It's a problem with the way this whole audit has been managed." ...
And here's the guy to help make it happen, already in place, working for "free".
Bttt!
I'm a definite tar and feather advocate!
GOOD tagline!
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