Atty, California. Gen. Rob Bonta issued a harsh warning to immigration detention centers across the state on Tuesday, notifying them that “significant improvements” must be made to comply with U.S. immigration and customs enforcement standards.
Bonta issued an alarm after the California Department of Justice published a 165-page report. The report documents the flaws in the use of arms against medical record management, suicide prevention strategies, and detainees in mental health conditions.
As President Trump increased the deportation agenda and escalated his confrontation with democratically-led states and cities over immigration enforcement, Bonta showed that California would not scrutinise the conditions of the facility for detained immigrants.
“A review of California facilities remains particularly important in light of efforts by the Trump administration to eliminate monitoring of conditions at immigration detention facilities and increase the inhumane campaign of mass immigration enforcement, and by cramming more people, it could exacerbate the important issues already present at these facilities,” Bonta said in a statement.
Geo Group, a private company that operates four California immigration detention facilities, challenged the findings of the report.
“GEO strongly opposes these unfounded allegations that are part of a long-standing politically and politically motivated, radical campaign to abolish the ice and end federal immigration detention by attacking federal immigration contractors,” a Geo Group spokesman said in a statement.
“This report by the California Attorney General is an unfortunate example of a politicized campaign by publicly published politicians and obstructs the federal government’s efforts to arrest, detain and deport illegal aliens of dangerous criminals in accordance with established federal law.”
The report is the fourth review of California’s privately run immigration detention facilities agency, requiring that the state Department of Justice investigates the conditions of detention centers until 2027, since lawmakers passed Congressional Bill 103, the 2017 law.
But the report released Monday, focusing on mental health, comes at a critical moment when the Trump administration promises to implement the largest deportation program in US history and reduce federal surveillance of conditions at such facilities.
Last month, the Department of Homeland Security closed its office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties and the offices of the Civil Rights and Immigration Services Ombudsman.
At the same time, the California facility has more people than it was two years ago, the report said. On April 16th, 3,100 were held at the California facility. Two years ago, it was 2,303. According to the report, only four of the people currently being held were identified as having a criminal history.
“The future growth in population levels in detention facilities will affect the facility’s ability to provide medical and other detainee needs,” the report said.
In a statement, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency said there was “no reasonable time to properly review” the report’s findings, but “US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency is committed to promoting a safe, safe, humanitarian environment for our custody people very seriously.”
“Right-day testing is one component of ICE’s multi-layered testing and monitoring process, ensuring transparency on how facilities meet the thresholds for care outlined in their facility’s contracts and the thresholds for the ICE’s national detention standards outlined,” the spokesman added. “In general, inspection teams provide reporting results to agency leadership to help develop and launch corrective action plans when discrepancies are identified.”
The spokesman added that ICE is encouraging detention facilities to report complaints to detention reports and information lines.
Talia Inllender, deputy director of the UCLA School Law of Law’s Center for Immigration Law and Policy, said the report raised a “gigantic red flag” and was disappointed to see the facility failing basic issues such as recordkeeping.
“Unfortunately, as federal oversight has decreased significantly at this point, it underscores the importance of California’s role in providing this oversight,” Inrender said. “If these issues already exist in the existing capabilities we have, it should be the big red flag we have – if not yet, it is an extreme humanitarian crisis in our hands.”
To that investigation, California Department of Justice staff worked with a team of corrections and medical professionals to examine confinement conditions such as force, discipline, access to medical care, and due process in state immigration detention facilities.
The report found inadequate recordkeeping and medical records maintenance at all six facilities, and said poor recordkeeping was “particularly concerned given the important nature of the records and the high degree of confidentiality these records require.”
In Adelanto and Desert View Annex, the file showed that healthcare providers entered a prescription that did not respond to conflicting diagnoses and diagnostics, the report says. At Golden State Annex, healthcare providers documented inconsistent and sometimes conflicting psychiatric diagnosis.
All facilities also lack suicide prevention and intervention strategies, the report says that standard suicide risk assessments are not consistently managed at Imperial, Golden State Annex and Mesa Verde.
Detainees also faced delays in ensuring adequate medical care at most facilities. In Desert View, staff were lax in infectious disease control, according to the report, detainees experienced long wait times for critical off-site care.
Investigators found that individuals in mental health diagnosis experienced the use of disproportionate forces. Staff from several facilities did not properly review their health records and consider their mental health status, in response to ICE standard care requests prior to engage in calculated use accidents.
The facility generally did not conduct the mental health review required for ICE detention standards before placing detainees in solitary confinement, the report said. Some individuals spent more than a year in isolation. This is a situation in which the report raises risks for people with underlying mental health conditions.
The report sings the Mesa Verde facility’s Putdown Search Policy as a source of concern. Detainees who were put down at any time described the search as invasive and inappropriate, and said they discouraged them from obtaining medical and mental health services and food, according to the report.
Investigators also raised concerns about the due process and flagged reports that detainees were unable to participate in a court hearing meaningfully because detainees failed to provide prescribed medication or other necessary treatment.
A GEO spokesperson said its support services include “24-hour access to medical, in-person and virtual and family visits, access to general and legal libraries, nutritionist-approved diet and specialty foods, and recreational amenities.” Its services are monitored by ICE and other groups within the Department of Homeland Security to ensure strict compliance with ICE detention standards.
Detainees in places where GEO provides medical services will provide “robust access to a team of healthcare professionals” and have access to off-site medical professionals, imaging facilities, emergency medical services and local community hospitals where necessary.
“The healthcare staff at Geo’s Ice Processing Center are more than twice as many state correctional facilities,” the spokesman said.
Inlender said he hoped the report would be a convened call to encourage state action to protect immigrants at detention centres. But she also said California has 2020 Act AB 3228, 2020, during Congress, where Bonta was leading the way, allowing people to sue private detention businesses in state courts for failing to comply with the standards of care outlined in facility contracts.
“Of course, it’s a tough battle and there are plenty to ask individuals who are already very vulnerable to bring these suits,” Inrender said. “But I think it’s a very important tool for accountability. I hope it will be used.”
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