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Abraxas Treatment Facility
Shelby, Ohio
GEO Group
Jul 13, 2021 mansfieldnewsjournal.com
Sheriff's office: 3 Abraxas juvenile runaways remain at large
SHELBY - Three juveniles who ran away from the
Abraxas treatment facility on Saturday are still at large, Capt. Donald
Zehner of the Richland County Sheriff's Office said Monday. At 2:15 p.m.
Saturday, two Columbus boys, ages 16 and 17, and another 16-year-old boy whose
address is listed as 2775 Ohio 39 NW - the Abraxas address - ran away from
the facility, according to the sheriff's report. Zehner said it appears
someone picked up the runaways in a vehicle outside the facility. In
response to a track record of numerous teens running away from the Abraxas
adolescent facility, Zehner told Jackson Township trustees in May the
facility had put back in place a notification system that calls residents
when a juvenile escapes from the residential treatment center. Zehner said the
system, called Group Cast Solutions, was already up and running in May.
More:Abraxas runaways led trooper on 22-mile high-speed pursuit in stolen
truck. In 2020, Richland County deputies investigated 42 runaways from
Abraxas. This year the sheriff's office has been dispatched to the facility
25 times from Jan. 1 to May 7, according to the sheriff's records office.
In 2020, deputies responded to 75 calls at the facility. Monica Hook, vice
president, GEO Care strategic marketing, The GEO Group Inc., parent company
of Abraxas, said previously that "Abraxas provides open residential
treatment services to adolescent males and outpatient treatment services to
adolescents. We cannot confirm or deny whether an individual has received
services. Individuals receiving treatment services are protected under
federal law (42 CFR) and HIPAA." Friday, two teen males ran away from
the facility but were captured shortly after.
Jan 28, 2021 mansfieldnewsjournal.com
Two males, ages 17 and 20, run away from Abraxas
SHELBY - A 17-year-old Marion teen who ran away
from Abraxas Jan 28, 2021 mansfieldnewsjournal.com in November and was
involved in the theft of a pickup on Stiving Road has run away from the
facility again. The teen and a 20-year-old Bellville man, who also was assigned
to the residential treatment facility, fled Tuesday and and remain missing
as of Wednesday morning, Richland County Sheriff's Office Capt.
Donald Zehner said. The Marion teen's prior escape occurred in November
when he and three other teens ran away from the treatment facility. Shelby
police located two of them. In the November incident, Ashland police
located the other two boys, a 17-year-old Mansfield youth and a (then)
16-year-old boy from Marion, on Center Street in Ashland. The boys were
found with a pickup stolen from a resident on Stiving Road. The truck also
had a firearm and ammunition inside it. The gun has not been recovered,
Zehner said earlier. No details were released on the runaway general
offense report Tuesday about how the two males escaped Abraxas at 12:56
a.m. Wednesday, Zehner said the Richland County Prosecutor's Office
approved felony theft charges on Nov. 6 for the Marion youth from Abraxas
who is again missing. Wednesday, Brian Bumpus, Richland County Juvenile
Court administrator, said two counts of grand theft motor vehicle were
dismissed against the Marion youth and two counts of receiving stolen
property were transferred to Marion Juvenile Court. He said the teen was
brought to the Richand County Juvenile Attention Center Nov. 6 and released
on Nov. 10 back to Abraxas. In 2020, Richland County deputies investigated
42 runaways from Abraxas, at 2775 Ohio 39. Wednesday, Monica Hook, vice
president, GEO Care strategic marketing, The GEO Group Inc., parent company
of Abraxas, said, “Abraxas provides open residential treatment services to
adolescent males and outpatient treatment services to adolescents. We
cannot confirm or deny whether an individual has received services.
Individuals receiving treatment services are protected under federal law
(42 CFR) and HIPAA.” In November, Hook provided this statement: “Abraxas
provides open residential treatment services to adolescent males and
outpatient treatment services to adolescents and adults. Abraxas has been a
valued employer and service provider in Shelby, Ohio for more than 25
years. Juvenile court systems and agencies throughout the state of Ohio
refer individuals to our programs that have co-occurring conditions such as
substance use and mental health disorders, family dysfunction, trauma and
abuse histories. We utilize multiple evidence- and competency-based
curricula, and promote safety and recovery through the active creation of a
trauma-informed community. "We cannot confirm or deny whether an
individual has received services. Individuals receiving treatment services
are protected under federal law (42 CFR) and HIPAA,” Hook said. In a
separate and unrelated runaway incident on Dec. 5, two other teens from
Abraxas ran away at 10:36 p.m. and stole a 2013 garbage truck from the nearby
parking lot of Rumpke at 2175 Stiving Road.
Dec 8, 2020 mansfieldnewsjournal.com
Two teens flee Abraxas, may have
stolen garbage truck
MANSFIELD - Two teens from Abraxas treatment
facility who ran away at 10:36 p.m. Saturday from the 2775 Ohio 39 W. facility,
were located sometime Sunday night or early Monday morning in Licking
County, according to the Richland County Sheriff's Office. Capt. Donald
Zehner said it is not yet known if the teens may have been involved in the
theft of a 2013 garbage truck from the nearby parking lot of Rumpke
Waste & Recycling at 2175 Stiving Road at 4:30 p.m. Sunday. Gayane
Makaryan, corporate communications manager at Rumpke, said the smaller
garbage truck used for residential customers, was behind a locked gate and
fence and the suspects drove the vehicle through the locked gate.
"We're thankful for our local law enforcement and the (highway) patrol
that got our vehicle back," she said. The truck, valued at $60,000,
was recovered in Licking County in the median of U.S. 70, according to the
Sheriff's Office report. Thee teens were located elsewhere in Licking
County and were not with the garbage truck, Zehner said. Two suspects are
listed on the on the Sheriff's Office's incident report suspect list, a
16-year-old boy from Cambridge and a 14-year-old boy from Chillicothe. So
far this year Richland County deputies have investigated 42 runaways from
Abraxas, including the two teens who fled the facility Saturday night.
Monica Hook, vice president, GEO Care strategic marketing, The GEO Group
Inc., parent company of Abraxas, could not be reached for comment.
Nov 7, 2020 mansfieldnewsjournal.com
Teen charged with murder in Columbus
shooting was housed at Abraxas
Residents often run away from
Mansfield-area treatment center
SHELBY - A teen arrested on murder charges in the
shooting death of a man outside a Columbus gun show was housed temporarily
at Abraxas Ohio, a Mansfield-area teen treatment facility from which
residents frequently run away. Javonte Williams, 17, is accused of fatally
shooting a 21-year-old man on Sept. 20 in the parking lot of the former
Westland Mall in Columbus, according to the Franklin County Sheriff's
Office. He was at the Abraxas facility, a former seminary on 2775 Ohio 39,
until Franklin County deputies took him into custody on an arrest warrant
Oct. 27 and transported him to the Richland County Detention Center,
according to a Richland County Sheriff’s Office report. Williams stayed at
the detention center for a little over 24 hours, according to court
administrator Brian Bumpus, who confirmed the teen had been committed at
Abraxas. So far this year Richland County deputies have investigated 40
runaways from Abraxas, including four teens who fled the facility at
Wednesday night. Abraxas is dealing with COVID-19 cases among its residents
and staff, a company official said Thursday. Two of the four teens who ran
away Wednesday were located by deputies and taken back to the facility the
same night. Friday, Ashland police located the other two boys, a 17-year-old
Mansfield youth and a 16-year-old boy from Marion, on Center Street in
Ashland. The boys were found with a pickup stolen from a resident on
Stiving Road, Richland County Sheriff's Capt. Donald Zehner said Friday
afternoon. The teens will be taken to the Richland County Detention Center,
Zehner said. Authorities have investigated 40 runaways this year at Abraxas
Ohio, a former seminary on 2775 Ohio 39 that now serves as a teen
residential treatment center. A 17-year-old murder suspect was housed there
temporarily in October. Richland County deputies assisted the Franklin
County deputies when Williams was taken into custody and transported to the
Richland County Detention Center without incident, according to the RCSO
report. Williams is charged with a delinquency count of aggravated murder,
accused of killing 21-year-old Sage Martin outside the former mall, near
the intersection of U.S. Route 40 and Interstate 270 on Columbus’ West
Side, according to The Dispatch, which reported the teen's arrest on Oct.
29. Monica Hook, vice president of strategic marketing for The GEO Group,
Inc., Abraxas' parent company, said in an email statement Thursday that
“Abraxas provides open residential treatment services to adolescent males
and outpatient treatment services to adolescents and adults. Abraxas has
been a valued employer and service provider in Shelby, Ohio, for more than
25 years. Juvenile court systems and agencies throughout the state of Ohio
refer individuals to our programs that have co-occurring conditions such as
substance use and mental health disorders, family dysfunction, trauma and
abuse histories. We utilize multiple evidence- and competency-based
curricula, and promote safety and recovery through the active creation of a
trauma-informed community." Hook said, "We cannot confirm or deny
whether an individual has received services. Individuals receiving
treatment services are protected under federal law (42 CFR) and HIPAA.”
Hook did not respond to specific questions from the News Journal including
whether Abraxas is a secure facility.
Nov 6, 2020 mansfieldnewsjournal.com
Two of four runaways from Abraxas
still at large
SHELBY - Authorities are still searching for two
of four teenage boys who ran away from Abraxas treatment facility at 2775
Ohio 39 North on Wednesday night. Two of the four boys, who are from
Cincinnati, ages 14 and 17, were located by Shelby Police Department and
returned to the facility Wednesday night. A 17-year-old Mansfield youth and
a 16-year-old boy from Marion remain at large, Richland County Sheriff's
Capt. Donald Zehner said Thursday morning. All four males were wearing gray
Abraxas uniforms when they fled the facility at 8:27 p.m., according to the
report. The runaway Mansfield teen was described as being 6-foot, 2 inches
tall and weighing 220 pounds. He has brown hair and hazel eyes, according
to the report. The Marion teen, 16, was described as 5 foot, 11 inches tall
and weighing 158 pounds. He has black hair and brown eyes, according to the
report. This year to date, the sheriff's office has investigated 40
runaways from the facility. There were 17 incident reports, with multiple
juveniles running away together, according to the sheriff's office. An hour
and a half after the teens' escape was reported, a 43-year-old man who resides
in the 2700 block of Stiving Road reported his 2015 white Ford pickup
stolen from his property. The truck, which had a snow plow hitch, contained
a .22-caliber handgun, a red toolbox, tools, a Stihl leaf blower, according
to a sheriff's office report. Zehner said deputies cannot connect the theft
of the vehicle to the runaways. Abraxas Ohio provides residential treatment
services to adolescent males and outpatient treatment services to
adolescents and adults. The facility has been serving youth and families
for 25 years through partnerships with juvenile court systems and child
care agencies throughout Ohio. The company has been expanding its service
offerings as the needs of adolescents and their families have increased in
complexity, Monica Hook, vice president of The GEO Group Inc., Abraxas'
parent company, told the News Journal in May. Many clients referred to the
programs have co-occurring conditions such as substance use and mental
health disorders, family dysfunction, trauma and abuse histories, according
to the Abraxas website. The facility had been a seminary before it became
the Abraxas treatment center.
ADAPPT, Reading Pnnylvania
GEO
Dec 20, 2017
readingeagle.com
Overdose deaths spark changes at ADAPPT halfway house in Reading
Following a series of Reading Eagle stories about eight overdose deaths
among residents of the ADAPPT halfway house, the state Department of
Corrections said it was making extensive physical changes and exploring
options for the facility. Separately, the House Judiciary Committee
scheduled a hearing on the issue for Jan. 25 in Berks County. The
department on Tuesday said the ongoing changes include the pending
installation of a full-body scanner, additional urine tests and K-9
searches, and potential changes to windows and doors. The goal is to reduce
the number of overdoses and prevent contraband from entering the facility.
State Rep. Barry Jozwiak, a member of the Judiciary Committee, said Tuesday
that the hearing was triggered by the newspaper stories and would take
place at Reading Regional Airport on Jan. 25 at 10 a.m. Meanwhile, the
newspaper received information from corrections that showed the Florida
for-profit company that runs ADAPPT was paid more than $7.6 million in
public money during a 15-month period ending in October. Seven people died
during that time. The money went to GEO Group, a New York Stock
Exchange-listed company whose chairman, George Zoley, made $5.2 million
last year. The company declined to say how much of the $7.6 million was
profit. Monica Hook, a GEO vice president, asked about ADAPPT's
profitability, said, “Facility-based financial information is competitive
in nature so we have always considered it proprietary.” Donna Kleedorfer,
whose son died inside ADAPPT last year, could not believe the size of the
payments. “I would like to see where the money is going,” she said. “What
are they doing with it? Because what my son said about the conditions in
there, that's no $7.6 million operation.” A newspaper story published Nov.
12 told of the eight overdose deaths — the first occurring on May 30, 2016
— among residents of ADAPPT, described by residents, parents and employees
as drug-infested and loose with security. The newspaper determined ADAPPT
had the worst fatal overdose record among 55 state-supervised halfway
houses. Those who died while living at ADAPPT were Barton Weikel Jr.,
Matthew Kleedorfer, Tracy Ulrich, James Leeroy Davis, Matthew Santamouris,
Matthew Feldbaum and Denise Ziagos. The newspaper was unable to reach
relatives of the eighth victim. He died May 6 after getting a pass to leave
the facility and overdosing several blocks away. Jozwiak said the planned
hearing would focus on the safety of individuals in corrections' halfway
houses. Other hearings in other parts of the state might follow, said
Jozwiak, a Bern Township Republican. “The Pennsylvania Department of
Corrections, along with the Board of Probation and Parole, supervises 55
halfway houses around the state,” the official announcement of the hearing
said. “Oversight of these facilities has been questioned due to recent
reports of individuals overdosing in and around facilities.” GEO Group
claims in press materials to be the world's leading provider of diversified
correctional, detention, community reentry, and electronic monitoring
services to government agencies. It reported $2.2 billion in revenue in
2016. GEO acquired ADAPPT in April when it purchased Community Education
Centers. GEO assumed a pre-existing contract between Community Education
Centers and the state that dated to July 1, 2013. It covered ADAPPT and
other halfway houses. The contract shows GEO gets $65.87 per day per
offender housed in the group home at ADAPPT. It receives $107.50 per day
per offender housed in ADAPPT's specialized drug and alcohol unit. Total
state payments for ADAPPT under the contract escalated from $3.7 million in
fiscal 2014 to nearly $6 million in fiscal 2017. When the 2017 payments are
added to those for the first three months of fiscal 2018 — framing the
15-month period when seven residents died of overdoses — the total is $7.6
million. “That is outrageous for the job they are doing,” Christine Ulrich,
a former Wernersville resident who lives in Conway, S.C., said when she was
told the payment level. Her daughter, Tracy Ulrich, was living at ADAPPT in
June when she died of a heroin and fentanyl overdose. “It's a dump,”
Christine Ulrich said. State Sen. Judy Schwank said she wanted a change in
leadership at ADAPPT. She wrote a letter to Corrections Secretary John
Wetzel that said her concerns have grown in the wake of the articles as she
has spoken to ADAPPT administrators, residents and families. “My biggest
concern is how its managed,” she said in an interview. The director of
ADAPPT, Michael Critchosin, could not be reached for comment. Schwank, a
Ruscombmanor Township Democrat, said she expected to meet with corrections
officials in early January. GEO Group has become part of the conversation
as Berks County commissioners ponder the future of the 84-year-old county
prison, now run by the county. Commissioners this summer toured a prison in
Delaware County run by GEO, and privatization has been suggested as one
option for the Berks facility. State Rep. Mark Gillen, a former corrections
officer who paid an unannounced visit to ADAPPT shortly after the first
story was published, questioned GEO's priorities. Besides the $5
million-plus compensation package given to the chairman, Gillen said GEO
has four vice presidents who receive more than $1 million each in
compensation. “If we can find a way to run the country with one vice
president, maybe they can figure out a way to do it at GEO Group,” he said.
“Somehow they are managing to accrue profits that end up in the paychecks
of very wealthy people.”
August 21, 2017 readingeagle.com
Reading halfway house a heroin horror story
As he approaches his 40th birthday, longtime heroin abuser and repeat
criminal offender Ryan Spangler has gained the mental clarity he believes
could launch him into a new and drug-free lifestyle.The problem, he says,
is that people keep overdosing on drugs right where he lives. Spangler
lives at ADAPPT, a halfway house on Walnut Street whose operation is funded
by the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. A 32-year-old Scranton man died of a
suspected drug overdose there early Aug. 12, according to Berks County
Coroner Dennis J. Hess. If toxicology tests confirm it as a drug death, it
would be the third fatal overdose at ADAPPT in eight weeks and the fifth in
15 months. Coroner's records also show a sixth ADAPPT resident died May 6
after he overdosed on fentanyl and morphine at a public library in Reading.
"It angers me," said Spangler. "I don't understand how a
facility that is meant to help people has had so many deaths." He and
other current and former ADAPPT residents told the Reading Eagle drug use
is a regular occurrence at the facility. They said their own attempts to
stay drug-free are compromised by seeing others use drugs at ADAPPT.
Another current ADAPPT resident who did not want to be identified said she
recently shot up heroin in bathrooms there. The father of yet another
resident said he complained repeatedly to ADAPPT managers and to the state
about his daughter's exposure to drug use there. Tammy Lutecki, who finished
a stint at ADAPPT last month, said there was a tumult at the facility June
26. The noise, Lutecki said, was focused on a heroin-abusing woman whose
syringes had been found in a toilet in ADAPPT three days earlier. Lutecki
said, "We woke up to some of the workers screaming, 'Oh my God, she's
dead!'. ADAPPT is one of 47 halfway houses overseen by the Pennsylvania
Department of Corrections. They allow people coming out of prisons to
re-enter society by taking on jobs and educational courses while living in monitored
facilities. Thirty-five of them, including ADAPPT, are run by contractors
hired by the state. "Any death is one too many, so our fight against
this opioid epidemic and our work to keep our facilities drug free will
never end," corrections spokeswoman Susan McNaughton wrote in an email
in response to written questions. The worsening drug crisis took 4,642
lives in Pennsylvania during 2016, an increase of 37 percent from the
previous year. McNaughton said the department's halfway houses are not exempt
from the opioid drug crisis. Corrections has placed naloxone, a medicine
that reverses the effects of an opioid overdose, in all facilities. It also
has a medication-assisted treatment program underway to help drug abusers,
McNaughton said, and it works to stay up to date on the latest drugs that
are being abused in an effort to educate its staff. "It is through
this education that we all work together to help put a dent in this
epidemic," she said. District Attorney John T. Adams said the deaths
at ADAPPT - as well as an increasing number of drug overdoses at the
Wernersville Community Corrections Center in South Heidelberg Township -
are troubling. "It is indicative of a problem I am seeing in our
population that is paroled from state prisons," he said. "These
facilities should be maintaining some sort of security protocols to prevent
drugs in the facility." Until recently, ADAPPT was owned by New
Jersey-based Community Education Centers. Under its Department of
Corrections contract - which involved many CEC facilities in Pennsylvania,
not just ADAPPT - the company was paid more than $71 million for services
provided in fiscal years 2013, 2014 and 2015, according to data provided by
the corrections department. In April, Community Education Centers was acquired
by GEO Group, a Boca Raton, Fla.-based public company whose shares are
listed on the New York Stock Exchange. McNaughton said GEO assumed the
contract the department had with Community Education Centers and payment
rates remained the same. A spokeswoman at ADAPPT in Reading referred
questions about the deaths there to GEO's headquarters. On Friday, the
company provided a written statement that read: "We are aware of the
opioid crisis and take these disturbing incidents very seriously, however our
facilities are not immune to this reality. Inside community-based re-entry
settings and throughout the community, addiction is a serious threat for
many individuals in our care." Since it acquired the CEC facilities,
the statement read, GEO has worked to evaluate and enhance security and
staff training, and to make sure residents can access evidence-based
rehabilitation programs to treat substance abuse problems. GEO logged more
than $2.1 billion in revenue in 2016. A press release said its acquisition
of CEC would increase revenue by about $250 million a year. Documents filed
with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission showed that GEO's chairman
and founder, George C. Zoley, received compensation of $5.2 million in
2016. McNaughton said the agency was working to respond to newspaper
requests for data on fatal drug overdoses in other halfway houses overseen
by the state. Dr. David Moylan, Schuylkill County coroner, said he knew of
no fatal overdoses at the two halfway houses in that county, Conewago
Pottsville and Gaudenzia New Destiny. Lehigh County Coroner Scott Grim said
none had occurred at Keenan House, a halfway house there. Corresponding
information was not immediately available from the coroner's office in
Chester County, which also has a state-sanctioned halfway houses. Hess, the
Berks coroner, said the ADAPPT overdoses were not surprising because the
population has a lot of criminal offenders with drug problems. Even if the
suspected drug death on Aug. 12 is confirmed by toxicology test results, Hess
said the total of five in a 15-month stretch was not overly large. "I
don't think anybody there is to blame," he said. Dr. Edward Latessa,
director and professor at the School of Criminal Justice at the University
of Cincinnati, said halfway house programs typically do not have high
mortality rates. At the same time, he said, Pennsylvania, like Ohio, has
been hard-hit by the opioid drug crisis. The situation at ADAPPT, he said,
sounded terrible for individuals who were trying to stay drug-free. But he
could not say whether the number of fatal overdoses at ADAPPT was excessive
in comparison to other facilities. He said: "Halfway houses are not
secure. People go out during the day." Spangler's criminal record
includes guilty pleas to retail theft, theft by deception, charges
associated with credit card fraud, and drug possession. "Everything I
have stolen was to get high," he said. He turns 40 in about three
weeks. He has been injecting heroin intermittently since he was 17. He has
two children. In the last few months, he has started receiving shots of
Vivitrol, a medicine that can negate the cravings for opioid drugs like
heroin. He said his mind has cleared, his judgment has improved and he has
lost the desire to get high. "This shot has completely changed the way
I think," he said. "I have a clear head. I have goals. I have the
motivation to achieve them." Spangler acknowledged he was speaking
publicly about a situation that some would prefer remain private. "I
don't want retribution and to be sent back to prison," he said.
"But I want the truth out."
Adelanto ICE Processing Center,
Adelanto City, California
Adelanto City, California
GEO Group
Apr 2, 2020
courthousenews.com
Private Immigration Prison Must Face
Forced Labor Class Action
SAN DIEGO (CN) – Private detention company
CoreCivic must face a novel employment class action by immigrants held at
its facilities in California and nationwide, a federal judge ruled
Wednesday in certifying forced labor claims against the private prison
operator. U.S. District Judge Janis Sammartino found in a 59-page order
that several classes could pursue their class action labor claims against
CoreCivic. Former detainees Sylvester Owino and Jonathan Gomez sued
CoreCivic – formerly known as Corrections Corporation of America – in 2017,
alleging the private prison operator violated federal and state labor laws
by using detainees “to clean, maintain, and operate” the Otay Mesa
Detention Facility in San Diego while paying detainees between $0.75 and
$1.50 a day for their work. The plaintiffs sought to certify five separate
classes. Sammartino certified three of them Wednesday: the California and
National Forced Labor Classes, as well as the California Labor Law Class on
several causes of action including failure to pay minimum wage or provide
wage statements, failure to pay all wages due upon termination and
imposition of unlawful conditions of employment. The certified classes
include immigrant detainees presently held in CoreCivic facilities. Both
the California and National Forced Labor Classes were certified in their
entirety. In doing so, Sammartino rejected CoreCivic’s argument because
both men were detained in California, they could not represent a nationwide
class. “The court concludes that plaintiffs adequately have established
standardized policies concerning the cleaning of common areas under threat
of discipline across defendant’s non-California facilities,” Sammartino
wrote. But the judge dismissed their claims seeking injunctive or
declaratory relief, finding the two men lack standing because they are
unlikely to again suffer future harms since Owino has been out of custody
for four years while Gomez has been out of ICE custody for six years and
neither has been detained or arrested since. Owino’s detention ended March
9, 2015 while Gomez’s detention ended on Sept. 18, 2013. Sammartino also
rejected certifying the Basic Necessities Classes for detainees who worked
at CoreCivic facilities and were only allowed to spend their $1 a day at
the detention facilities’ commissary stores. On the California Labor Law
Class, Sammartino found the former detainees could certify several claims
challenging their alleged misclassification as “volunteers” rather than
employees. As to claims regarding overtime wages, Sammartino found CoreCivic’s
own “standard policies” and handbooks indicate no overtime was ever paid
because “compensation was $1.00 per day.” She also found the plaintiffs had
established CoreCivic employs common “sanitation and discipline policies”
where detainees are required to clean common living areas under threat of
discipline. “There is no indication from the face of the policies that
these tasks are to be performed only by those participating in the
[Voluntary Work Program], and there exists a dispute of fact based on the
declarations submitted by staff of defendant, who testified that the
sanitation policies did not require detainees to clean up after others,”
Sammartino found. Disciplinary guidelines regarding a detainee’s refusal to
clean common areas “can be found in handbooks from other of defendant’s
facilities, both within and outside of California,” Sammartino noted.
Records of when detainees worked – while incomplete – appear to show the
set schedules for various positions held by participants in Volunteer Work
Program, Sammartino pointed out. “This evidence may allow the trier of fact
to determine which participants in the [Volunteer Work Program] were paid
less than the minimum wage—and by how much— based on the difference between
the payment received and the number of hours per shift for the position,”
Sammartino wrote. Attorneys with Foley & Lardner, representing the
class members, did not immediately respond to an email request for comment.
CoreCivic said in a statement its detainees are not subject to disciplinary
action if they choose not to participate in its Voluntary Work Program.
“All of our ICE detention facilities are operated in full compliance with
ICE standards, including federally established payment of allowances for
those detainees who participate in the voluntary work program,” CoreCivic
said. “Detainees are subject to no disciplinary action whatsoever if they
choose not to participate in the work program, nor are they forced to
participate in the work program or perform the labor reserved for that
program. We have worked in close partnership with ICE for more than 30
years and will continue to provide a safe and humane environment to those
entrusted to our care.” CoreCivic is represented by Arizona law firm Struck
Love.
Mar 20, 2019 sbsun.com
Immigrant
detainees stage hunger strike at Adelanto facility About 100 people aren't
eating, to raise awareness of mistreatment
Immigrant
detainees at the Adelanto Detention Facility, a privately run center that
has been criticized for providing inadequate care, are staging a hunger
strike to bring attention to conditions there. Their demands: adequate
medical care, an end to what they describe as abusive treatment, and access
to edible, nutritious food. The hunger strike began in the facility’s west
wing on Thursday, March 14, when some 150 men refused to go to the
cafeteria, said Lizbeth Abeln, immigrant detention coordinator for the
Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice. That led to a brief lockdown, with
detainees kept in their immediate areas and visits with attorneys and
families cancelled. She said some some detainees still were not being
allowed visitors as of March 19. It was unclear how many are still
participating in the hunger strike, but the number is believed to be at
least 100, Abeln said. “They’re trying to highlight the abuses… The
guards at GEO are not respecting their basic human rights,” Abeln said,
referring to GEO Group, Inc., the company that owns and runs the facility.
The immigrant detainees were particularly upset this week because a young
detainee was beaten up by at least one guard and he did not receive
immediate medical treatment, according to Abeln. A spokeswoman for GEO
referred questions to ICE, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
agency. Lori Haley, a spokeswoman for ICE, said she could not reply to the
allegation that a teen detainee was injured by a guard without knowing the
names of the people involved. The strike comes on the heels of reports that
blasted the facility for its care – or lack of care – of people who are in
detention while they await for their cases to be processed in immigration
court. (Detention centers like Adelanto’s house people who crossed into the
United States illegally, and others who arrived legally, many of them
seeking asylum. The Adelanto center, which can house up to 2,000 detainees,
has long faced criticism for how it treats its detainees. Last year,
federal investigators found nooses fashioned from bedsheets in some 20
cells. There was at least one suicide, by hanging, in 2017, and five other
deaths, some due to medical neglect, according to the Inland Coalition for
Immigrant Justice. A report released earlier this month by Disability
Rights California, a non-profit legal watchdog group, found that people
running Adelanto under report the number of suicide attempts at the center,
and that detainees are subject to “punitive, prison-like conditions that
harm people with disabilities.” The report also found that Adelanto
detainees get inadequate medical and mental health care, and that guards have
used pepper spray on some mentally ill detainees. Last month, California
Attorney General Xavier Becerra issued a separate report that also
described detainees getting inadequate access to medical care, legal
counsel and family visits at Adelanto and other centers in California that
house immigrant detainees. Adelanto is the largest such privately run
facility in the state. A former detainee, Carlos Hidalgo, 51, of North
Hollywood, said he was being held at Adelanto when he led a hunger strike
there in 2016. The goal at the time, he said, was to raise awareness about
complaints echoed this week – better medical care, better treatment, decent
food. Immigrant detainees in Adelanto were treated like criminals, even
though they are not criminal detainees, and often didn’t receive prompt
medical treatment, he said. The food, he added, was sometimes beyond gross:
“They gave us ground turkey but we found it infected with maggots.” The
outcome of that three-day hunger strike? Officials locked down the facility
and he was transferred to the Theo Lacy Facility in Orange County, he said.
Hidalgo doesn’t expect much will come out of the current hunger strike
either, except raising awareness. “It ain’t going to get very far. But it’s
a good way to call attention to the situation that everyone turns a blind
eye to.”
Mar 6, 2019 sbsun.com
A nonprofit slams the Adelanto Detention Facility as posing harm to
people with mental health issues and other disabilities.
A Nigerian man held last year at Adelanto Detention Center in San
Bernardino was pepper sprayed twice while in custody – once because he
wouldn’t stand up, and a second time as he attempted to hang himself in his
cell. “If I say I am going to hurt myself, why pepper spray me?” said the
man identified only as Ugo. “Why not try to help me?” His story was part of
a report on the treatment of mentally ill detainees at the Adelanto
facility issued Tuesday by Disability Rights California, a non-profit that
serves as a legal watchdog to protect the rights of people with disabilities.
The 64-page report, “There is no safety here,” is one of a several recent
investigations that have found problems at the Adelanto Detention Center
and other California facilities that hold migrant detainees. Last month,
California Attorney General Xavier Becerra issued a report that found
immigrant detainees – people who typically are held for civil, not criminal
actions – are treated like prisoners, kept in their cells up to 22 hours a
day, and offered inadequate access to medical care and legal counsel. Other
reports, from different groups, have cited the facilities for failing to
provide adequate services. At least one report last year noted that at
Adelanto, which can hold nearly 2,000 people at any one time, investigators
found nooses made by detainees in as many as 20 cells. The year-long
investigation from Disability Rights California includes these findings:
GEO Group Inc., a private contractor that owns and operates the Adelanto
facility, significantly underreports data on the number of suicide attempts
at the facility, using a definition that is too narrow: “serious self-harm
intended to cause death.” Whereas the Center for Disease Control and
Prevention defines it as “a non-fatal self-directed potentially injurious
behavior” with an intent to die. Adelanto detainees are subjected to
“punitive, prison-like conditions that harm people with disabilities”
that may be violating their constitutional rights. The San Bernardino
County facility has an inadequate mental care and medical care system,
which turns to harsh institutional responses, like solitary-type
confinement, to people facing psychiatric crisis instead of endorsing
therapeutic measures. A spokesperson for the Sacramento-based public
relations firm Stutzman Public Affairs, which represents the GEO Group,
said Tuesday that their client already has addressed concerns in the
report. “While we always appreciate the opportunity to improve processes
and procedures, we strongly dispute the claim that suicide attempts were
underreported,” the spokesperson said in an e-mail. “Furthermore, many of
the recommendations outlined in the report were already in place… In all of
the facilities that we manage on behalf of the federal government, we are
deeply committed to delivering high-quality, culturally responsive services
in safe and humane environments.” Those who find themselves in immigration
detention facilities like Adelanto, which can hold nearly 2,000 people, are
somewhere in the immigration process, either awaiting deportation or a court
hearing. Some crossed into the United States illegally. Some came
into the country legally, seeking asylum. They are considered civil
detainees, not criminal inmates. The report said few detainees, even from
third-world countries, are prepared for the conditions they encounter in
the facilities, many of which, like Adelanto, are privately run. “The
punitive, prison-like conditions disproportionately harm people with mental
illness and disabilities.” Since Donald Trump became president, the number
of immigrants detained has increased. And a growing number of those
detainees are asylum seekers, who say they are fleeing violence and
persecution in their homelands: 27 percent of Adelanto’s population was
seeking asylum, according to the report. Among recent detainees there is
growing population of people with mental health needs and disabilities, a
category of asylum seeker that under previous administrations was a lower
priority for detention. The report said that includes detainees like Sofia,
an asylum seeker from Russia who was detained at Adelanto with her husband
in 2017. Visits with her husband were rare, and her requests to speak
with him, or send him a letter, typically were denied, she told Disability
Rights California officials. Although Sofia told investigators she
previously had no history of suicidal thoughts before detention, after four
and a half months at Adelanto she tried to kill herself. “I was tired of
being here, of being detained,” she said. “It was just too stressful.”
Meanwhile, her husband, Aleksei, said he too became so distraught that he
also attempted suicide. But after stints in a suicide watch cell, which he
told investigators were like “torture,” he told the medical staff that
“everything is fine” because he didn’t want to go back there. U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement reported one suicide attempt in 2016,
three in 2017 and none in 2018, according to the report. But the
nonprofit, “without conducting anything close to a comprehensive review of
all detainees,” found more. There was at least one suicide, by hanging, in
2017, and five other deaths, some due to medical neglect, according to the
Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice. The report also found that
detainees at Adelanto who show signs of mental illness, or request such
services, have only “brief” contacts with mental health experts, and that
the treatments they do receive are not individualized. The report added
that individual and group counseling is nearly non-existent, and there is
little opportunity for detainees to engage in activities like reading.
Mario Perez, who lives in San Bernardino County and has lived in the United
States since he was 5, said he experienced some of the issues reflected in
the report. Perez, 31, was at the Adelanto facility for six months last
year, picked up at his home by immigration agents while he was under house
arrest following a conviction for driving under the influence. At the time,
Perez was taking medication for depression. But he went the first week at
Adelanto without his medication, even though he asked for it
repeatedly. Visits with a psychologist and a psychiatrist ran about 5
to 10 minutes each time, once a month. “I was able to advocate for myself,”
said Perez, who now works for the Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice,
assisting people who leave the Adelanto facility. “But if you are not
bilingual, and can’t speak up for yourself, that’s a whole different
issue.” While he didn’t see any nooses mentioned in other reports about
Adelanto, Perez said he heard other detainees and inmates talk often about
wanting to throw themselves down the stairs or jump off a second floor
inside the building. “They would comment: ‘I can’t do do this anymore. I
can’t be here for another day.’”
Feb 3, 2019
vvdailypress.com
NPR sues Adelanto over public records access
ADELANTO — In a lawsuit filed Wednesday, National Public Radio alleged
the city failed to obey the state’s public records law. The suit alleges
the city unlawfully denied NPR reporter Tom Dreisbach access to public
records he sought regarding living conditions at the Adelanto Detention
Center. The lawsuit asks the court to order the city to release the
records. In 2010, Geo Group, one of the two largest private prison
corporations in the United States, purchased the prison located on Rancho
Road from the city for $28 million. It expanded in 2012 and today reigns as
the largest immigration detention center in California. Since 2011, the
city has acted as a pass-through agency in an agreement that allows U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement to hold immigration detainees at the
facility. ICE pays Adelanto for the service, then the city pays GEO Group.
The city collects administrative fees for its part. According to the
lawsuit, Dreisbach requested public records from ICE in August 2018. He
sought information about “emergency grievances” made by detainees, along
with the staff’s responses, plus information on the use of force, including
audio and visual records. ICE denied his requests, telling Dreisbach to
contact the detention center directly. In September 2018, Dreisbach asked
for records from Adelanto, the operator of the detention center listed in
the agreement. The request was made under the California Public Records
Act. On Jan. 1, 2018 the Dignity Not Detention Act became law. It demands
any facility detaining “a noncitizen pursuant to a contract with a city,
county, city and county, or a local law enforcement agency is subject to
the California Public Records Act.” The lawsuit argues this law guarantees
Dreisbach access to the records he requested. The city denied Dreisbach’s
request, saying it did not possess “public records responsive to the
request” because it did not have “actual and constructive possession” of
the records, according to the lawsuit. The law firm representing the city
acknowledged NPR was entitled to records under the California Public
Records Act, but from Geo Group, not the city. In the lawsuit, NPR contends
Geo Group possesses the records, and under the agreement between the
parties, the city has “unfettered access to the records of the detention
facility.” The agreement also requires the city to accurately maintain
those records, the lawsuit said. Dreisbach then requested the records
directly from Geo Group, which denied his requests and directed him back to
ICE. “The contracts between ICE, GEO, and the city all permit the city
access to any and all documents related to detainee custody and care,” the
lawsuit said. “The city therefore has, at a minimum, an interest in and
constructive possession of the records sought by NPR.” Adelanto City
Manager Jessie Flores told the Daily Press that “the City previously
provided all documents in its possession in response to a Public Records
Act request received from NPR. The City received the Writ yesterday and the
City Attorney’s office is reviewing it and will be responding.” In a
statement emailed to the Daily Press, Geo Group contended that it is
“obligated to follow contractual requirements, which provide that
information related to the operation of ICE Processing Centers is under the
control of the agency. The public disclosure of this information is
governed by those contractual requirements and applicable federal laws and
regulations. Accordingly, GEO has referred to ICE requests for information
that is under control of the agency.” Lori K. Haley, a U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement spokeswoman, said she is unable to comment on lawsuits.
Dec 24, 2018 newsweek.com
ICE BLOCKS IMMIGRANTS FROM LAWYERS WITH DRACONIAN PHONE RULES IN
CALIFORNIA, ACLU SAYS
An immigration detention center in California has effectively worked to
keep immigrants from contacting lawyers through phone rules, a lawsuit
alleged last week. Advocate groups have said calls for those detained in
the Adelanto Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Processing Center
calls are prohibitively expensive. And if a detainee is able to scrounge
together money for call, then they calls are recorded and it is required
that someone answer the phone nearly immediately—voicemails are not an
option. "Legal representation is fundamental to ensuring due process
for immigrants facing removal, but when our detained clients can't
effectively communicate with us, our abilities to be effective advocates
are compromised," said Meeth Soni, co-legal director at the Immigrant
Defenders Law Center, in a statement released by the American Civil
Liberties Union (ACLU) of Southern California. The lawsuit detailed allegations of how
difficult it can be for a detained immigrant to reach a lawyer. The suit
alleges that an asylum-seeker named Desmond Tenghe has not been allowed to
access funds he brought with and previous earnings from a different
detention center were not transferred to Adelanto. Making just $1 per day
working at Adelanto and denied free calls, the suit alleges, Tenghe has to
spend a week's earnings to make a call and has to hope he reaches a person
immediately. It took him two months to get ahold of his sponsor in
Maryland, the suit alleges. "Over the course of weeks, Plaintiff
Tenghe tried to call at least seven different legal organizations,
including Catholic Charities, El Rescate, and others. Due to Defendants’
“positive acceptance” requirement for telephone calls, the telephone calls
have either disconnected after ringing once or twice or continued to ring
without answer. Plaintiff Tenghe has also attempted to call Catholic
Charities to obtain documents about current country conditions in his
country of origin, but those telephone calls also have not connected
because of Defendants’ “positive acceptance” requirement." The GEO
Group, a large contractor for ICE that runs the Adelanto facility, told the
Miami New Times they are simply following procedures. "As a services
provider to ICE, GEO plays no role in establishing immigration law and we
comply with the performance-based standards set by the government," a
spokesperson told the outlet. "We would refer specific questions about
these policies [be addressed] to ICE." The lawsuit from the ACLU of
Southern California and the Immigrants’ Rights Clinic at Stanford Law
School further alleges that phone call recording policies at detention
centers hinders conversations about legal strategies and that there are
just 10 private meeting spaces at Adelanto for nearly 2,000 detainees.
"The U.S. government has placed arbitrary barriers between immigrant
detainees and their lawyers which must be eliminated if justice is to be
served," said Ben Johnson, executive director of the American
Immigration Lawyers Association, in the ACLU press release.
Oct 10, 2018 dailycaller.com
PRIVATE IMMIGRATION DETENTION CENTER SAYS IT HAS
ALREADY FIXED PROBLEMS IDENTIFIED IN WATCHDOG REPORT
GEO Group, the operator of an immigration detention
center in California, says it moved to address problems identified in a
surprise government inspection well before they were detailed in a report
released in early October. The Department of Homeland Security’s Office of
Inspector General found several deficiencies in its May inspection of the
Adelanto ICE Processing Center, including inadequate medical care and
improper use of restricted housing. In a letter to ICE officials,
Adelanto’s warden said the facility took action as soon as the problems
were noted and had corrected the issues by early September. A privately
owned immigration detention center in California says it had fixed problems
identified in a surprise government inspection by early September, nearly a
month before the results of the inspection were released to the public.
Inspectors with the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector
General (DHS-OIG) conducted an unannounced inspection of the Adelanto ICE
Processing Center in May. The OIG’s findings, which included allegations of
inadequate medical care and inappropriate use of solitary confinement, were
published Oct. 2 in a memo that sparked outrage among immigration activists
and civil rights groups. (RELATED: Watchdog Finds Hanging ‘Nooses,’ Lack Of
Medical Care At ICE Detention Facility). But GEO Group, the owner and operator of the Adelanto center, disputed
some of the problems noted by OIG auditors and said it took corrective
action on others as soon as they were identified. “We take the findings
outlined by the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector
General (OIG) regarding the Adelanto ICE Processing Center very seriously,”
company spokesman Pablo Paez said in a statement. “While we believe that a
number of the findings lacked appropriate context or were based on
incomplete information, we have already taken steps to remedy areas where
our processes fell short of our commitment to high-quality care.” GEO
Group, one of the country’s largest operators of private prisons and
immigration detention centers, bought the Adelanto facility in 2010 and
began housing ICE detainees there the following year. Today, Adelanto
houses about 1,700 detainees, making it the largest immigration detention
facility in California. DHS-OIG’s surprise inspection of the facility
turned up three issues the watchdog said were “significant threats” to
detainee health and safety. Inspectors discovered braided bed sheets —
referred to as “nooses” by staff — hanging in several inmates’ cells, even
though detainees had previously used similar sheets in suicide attempts.
Additionally, inspectors determined that detainees were being prematurely placed
in disciplinary segregation before they were found guilty of a rule
violation and were not given “timely and adequate” medical care — both
violations of ICE national detention standards. In some cases, detainees
had to wait years for basic dental care, leading to tooth loss and
“unnecessary extractions,” the OIG report stated. Adelanto managers took
steps to correct the problems immediately after the inspection, according
to a letter from warden James Janecka to ICE officials obtained by The
Daily Caller News Foundation. In the letter dated Sept. 6, Janecka noted
that detainees often used the braided bed sheets as privacy barriers
between cell beds and toilets, but added that he had instructed staff to
remove “any improvised curtains or any other visual obstructions.” With
respect to the improper use of disciplinary segregation at Adelanto,
Janecka conceded that detainees had been placed in the center’s restricted
housing section while their cases were still in pending status. He said the
mistakes were the result of delays in putting disciplinary records into
detainees’ files, leading to confusion about whether inmates met the
threshold for restricted housing. Under a corrective action plan
implemented in May, “timelines will be met, and each detainee’s status in
the disciplinary process will be readily discernible,” Janecka wrote. As
for concerns about inadequate medical and dental care, GEO Group says it is
conducting a review with its medical services subcontractor “to ensure all
medical and dental care is provided at the highest quality and in a timely
manner, and to hold accountable those who are not meeting these
expectations.”As of Sept. 6, there was no longer a backlog for dental
cleaning at Adelanto, Janecka said.
Oct
3, 2018 latimes.com
Nooses in cells, rotting teeth — report details harsh conditions at
Adelanto immigration facility
A Nicaraguan man who was detained at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center
died in March 2017 after he was found hanging in his cell from his
bedsheets. Not long after, two other detainees also used sheets in an
attempt to hang themselves. When federal officials arrived in May of this
year for a surprise inspection of the privately run immigration detention
facility, they found nooses made from bedsheets in 15 of 20 cells. “When we
asked two contract guards who oversaw the housing units why they did not
remove the bedsheets, they echoed it was not a high priority,” officials
with the Department of Homeland Security inspector general’s office wrote
in a scathing report made public Tuesday detailing dangerous conditions
found at the facility during their unannounced visit. The nooses are just
one of many problems posing “significant health and safety risks”
identified by federal inspectors at Adelanto, which can house nearly 2,000
detainees as they await the outcome of their immigration cases Detainees
reported waiting “weeks and months” to see a doctor, and inspectors met
with a dentist who dismissed the necessity of fillings, and suggested that
detainees use string from their socks to floss, the report said. Inspectors
also said they found that detainees were commonly subjected to disciplinary
segregation before being found guilty of violating rules. The report is the
latest from government inspectors to document significant deficiencies at
Adelanto since it opened in 2011. It comes one year after immigrant
advocates raised alarms about conditions at the facility following the
deaths of three detainees in a three-month period in 2017. The Times
reported in August 2017 that there had been at least five attempted
suicides at the facility in less than one year, according to a review of
911 calls. Lori Haley, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs
Enforcement, said in a statement that immigration officials take the
findings seriously and have “agreed to conduct a full and immediate review
of the center to ensure compliance with detention standards and expedite
necessary corrective actions.” Tens of thousands of ICE detainees have
passed through the Adelanto facility since it opened seven years ago. It is
owned and operated by the GEO Group, which runs dozens of private prisons
and detention centers around the country. Among those held in the facility
are asylum seekers, people caught in immigration sweeps and those
identified by authorities as potentially deportable after landing in jail.
Some detainees arrive at the facility soon after crossing the border;
others after having lived in the U.S. for decades. They can stay in
detention for months, and in some cases years, as their cases are decided.
Pablo Paez, a spokesman for GEO Group, referred questions about the
inspector general's report to ICE. According to the report, in the months
after Osmar Epifanio Gonzalez-Gadba, 32, of Nicaragua was found hanging
from bedsheets in his cell and later died, ICE compliance reports
documented at least three suicide attempts by hanging at Adelanto, two of
which specifically used bedsheets. Still, when inspectors visited the
facility, they found braided sheets that both staff and detainees referred
to as nooses hanging from the vents in 15 of the approximately 20 male
detainee cells that they visited in four housing units. The guard who
escorted the inspectors began removing the nooses but stopped after
realizing how many there were, the report says. Some detainees said they
use the unfurled sheets for privacy, while others said they used them as
clotheslines. One detainee, however, told inspectors that he had seen “a
few attempted suicides using the braided sheets by the vents.” “The guards
laugh at them and call them ‘suicide failures’ once they are back from
medical,” the detainee told officials. Inspectors also found during their
visit that all 14 detainees who were in disciplinary segregation at the
time were put there before being found guilty of a prohibited act or rule
violation. And though ICE standards require face-to-face medical
assessments of all detainees in segregation at least once a day, inspectors
observed two doctors in the unit stamping their name on detainee records
outside their cells “without having any contact with 10 of the 14 detainees
in disciplinary segregation." The report also notes that some
detainees reported waiting “weeks and months” to see a doctor and said that
appointments were canceled without explanation, with detainees placed back
on the waiting list. From November 2017 to April 2018, detainees filed 80
medical grievances with the facility for not receiving urgent care, not
being seen for months for persistent health conditions and not receiving
prescribed medication, according to the report. Inspectors also highlighted
serious problems with dental care at the facility, saying detainees are
placed on wait lists for months and, sometimes, years to receive basic
care, “resulting in tooth loss and unnecessary extractions in some cases.”
No detainees have received fillings in the last four years, according to
the report. One detainee reported multiple teeth falling out while waiting
more than two years for cavities to be filled. One dentist at the facility
told inspectors he did not have time to complete cleanings or fillings,
according to the report. “The dentist dismissed the necessity of fillings
if patients commit to brushing and flossing,” the report states. “Floss is
only available through detainee commissary accounts, but the dentist
suggested detainees could use string from their socks to floss if they were
dedicated to dental hygiene.” This is not the first time government
inspectors have noted problems — often related to medical care — at the
Adelanto facility. An annual review in November 2011 found that
"medical officials were not conducting detainee health appraisals
within 14 days of arrival,” and nurses were performing health assessments
without proper training or certification. A 2012 report by ICE's Office of
Detention Oversight found that many requests for medical care were delayed.
That report also said the death of detainee Fernando Dominguez Valdivia in
March of that year followed "egregious errors" by medical staff
and that a review found it could have been prevented. A report on the 2015
death of Raul Ernesto Morales-Ramos, also prepared by the Office of
Detention Oversight, said Adelanto failed to provide Morales-Ramos with
timely and comprehensive medical care, among other lapses. More recently, the
Office of Detention Oversight’s review of Gonzalez-Gadba’s 2017 suicide
also faulted Adelanto for failing to meet national standards. That report
said that in the days before his death, Gonzalez-Gadba reported he had been
sexually assaulted at Adelanto, but medical staff did not conduct a medical
assessment in response to that allegation. It also said that guards failed
to check on Gonzalez-Gadba, who was being held in segregated housing, at
least every 30 minutes, as required. He was found hanging in his cell 37
minutes after an officer’s last logged security round, according to the
review. In its report, the inspector general’s office also noted the
medical care deficiencies that were found at Adelanto following the deaths
of detainees and urged immigration officials to fix the problems. "ICE
must take these continuing violations seriously and address them
immediately," the report says. Haley, the ICE spokeswoman, said a
contracted inspection firm is scheduled to inspect Adelanto again this month.
"Comprehensive medical care is provided from the moment detainees
arrive and throughout the entirety of their stay," she said. Speaking
about the nooses, she said "ICE recognizes that this can present a
dangerous safety vulnerability and will intensify efforts to address this
issue."
Jul 15, 2017 vvdailypress.com
Adelanto Detention Facility barred from expanding for another decade
ADELANTO — The Adelanto Detention Facility will be barred from
expansion for the next decade, thanks to a recent moratorium passed by
state legislators. California’s budget for the 2017-18 fiscal year, which
began July 1, included an action that targets the federal immigration
crackdown by requiring that the state attorney general review each county,
local or private detention facility where noncitizens are being held. The
action also blocks counties and municipalities from signing new contracts
or expanding existing contracts to detain immigrants, according to a report
from the Associated Press. “The bill isn’t shutting down any centers, but
it is preventing the Trump administration from expanding and entrenching
immigration detention centers further,” Community Initiatives for Visiting
Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC) co-founder/co-executive director
Christina Fialho said. The Adelanto Detention Facility, privately operated
by the GEO group, contracts with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
(ICE) to house federal immigration detainees. According to Fialho, the new
bill bars city officials from modifying their contract with ICE and the GEO
group to expand the detention facility for 10 years. The bill also earmarks
$1 million a year for the Attorney General’s office to monitor immigration
detention centers in the state, the first law in the country that gives a
state agency the power to monitor federal immigration facilities, Fialho
said. “Basically, it’s going to ensure that people in immigration detention
are treated humanely,” Fialho said. CIVIC and other advocacy groups have
regularly called upon ICE and GEO officials to make changes at the
facility, citing detainee deaths and poor conditions, according to a
previous Daily Press report. While ICE officials declined to directly
comment on the bill and CIVIC’s statement, they explained that the agency
uses a variety of facilities — including federal, state, local and
contractor-owned facilities — across the country to house detainees in an
effort to curb costs. The new bill would hinder these efforts while failing
to curb immigration detention, they suggested. “Placing limitations on
ICE’s detention options here in California won’t prevent the agency from
detaining immigration violators,” ICE officials said in a statement. “It
will simply mean ICE will have to transfer individuals encountered in
California to detention facilities outside the state, at a greater distance
from their family, friends, and legal representatives.” ICE officials said
the agency seeks to house detainees within the geographical area of their
arrest “whenever possible” to reduce the need for transfers to other
facilities. This, in turn, leads to lower costs and shorter stays for
detainees in ICE custody, they said.
Jul 6, 2017 kqed.org/news
Hunger Strike at California’s Biggest Immigration Detention Center
Activists say that more than 30 people began a hunger strike at the
Adelanto Detention Facility on Tuesday, seeking better medical care and
release pending their immigration court dates. In the last five years, six
people have died while being detained — three of them since March 27 — at
the San Bernardino County facility, the largest immigration detention
center in California. It can hold about 1,900 detainees and was almost at capacity
in March, according to data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Detainees say this is the fourth hunger strike they’ve conducted at the
facility since June 12. During breakfast that morning nine men, mostly
asylum-seekers from El Salvador, linked arms and refused to return to their
cells until they could speak to guards about their concerns. Guards used
pepper spray and physically removed the men to solitary cells, according to
Tristan Call, a spokesman for the detainees, and ICE spokeswoman Virginia
Kice. Then they began the hunger strike. “We are not anyone’s toys,” said
Isaac Lopez Castillo, a 27-year-old from El Salvador, in a Facebook video
about the strike. The men filed a complaint with the Department of Homeland
Security’s Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties alleging that they
were beaten and denied medical care and access to their attorneys. GEO
Group, the private prison company that owns and operates the facility, is
investigating the incident, and ICE officials will review that probe,
according to Kice. “The claim the men involved in this disturbance were
beaten is a gross and regrettable exaggeration,” wrote Kice in an email. On
June 14, a group of nearly 30 women refused to eat for about 24 hours —
asking for medical care, “basic respect” from jail guards, lower bond rates
and to be reunited with their families. Call said that they ended the
strike after many of the women received medical care on June 15. Then, on
June 22, eight of the same men from the June 12 action began a new hunger
strike, after one was deported. Call said that detainees throughout the
facility have refused food periodically since they began striking on June
12. Kice says that the agency will implement hunger strike protocols,
including medical supervision, if detainees refuse food for more than 72
hours. While the city of Adelanto holds the contract with ICE to detain
immigrants in the facility, the city also has a contract with GEO Group to
run it. Early last year, GEO Group stopped providing its own medical care
and subcontracted with Correct Care Solutions, keeping on many of the same
staff. ICE’s own
investigators found problems at the facility, including health care delays,
poor record keeping and failures to properly report sexual assaults. In a
federal investigation into one of the California deaths, inspectors noted
that the person who died had waited more than a year to see a specialist,
that the high turnover of medical staff led to inadequate care and that a
dearth of laboratory services led to delays in treatment. Independent
medical experts for Human Rights Watch analyzing ICE’s investigation found
that the man probably suffered from symptoms of cancer for two years. Detainees are also requesting to be released on their own recognizance,
on bond or to receive a monitoring device. Immigrant detainees, including
asylum-seekers, can wait weeks, months and even years for their day in
immigration court. There are currently 326 immigration judges nationwide —
and they’re handling nearly 600,000 pending cases, according to the
Department of Justice and data from Syracuse University’s TRAC research
center. Even if the immigration courts didn’t accept a single additional
case, it would take longer than two years to go through the backlog,
according to TRAC. Both ICE and immigration judges can release people. ICE
officers make an initial determination about whether people should be
detained while their immigration cases are pending. “ICE makes such
determinations on an individual basis taking into account all facets of the
person’s situation, including the individual’s immigration history and
criminal record, if applicable. Likewise, the agency also considers an
alien’s family ties, any humanitarian issues that may be involved, and
whether the person is a potential flight risk,” wrote Kice. Detainees who
have been convicted of criminal activity are mandatorily held in detention.
Currently, the U.S. Supreme Court is set to rehear a case that could
require immigration courts to conduct bond hearings every six months. The
named plaintiff in the case, Alejandro Rodriguez, spent three years in ICE
detention without a hearing for his release. Court records analyzed by TRAC
showed that at least half — and in some years upward of two-thirds — of
people are held in ICE detention while the DHS begins court proceedings to
deport them. The median immigration bond was set at $8,000 in fiscal year
2016. About one in five people granted bond stayed in detention, presumably
because they can’t afford it. In a statement during the first hunger
strike, the men wrote that they cannot afford bail: “We are from El
Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala. We ask for your attention, because
Adelanto is one of the prisons which exists for those who are seeking
political asylum, and in reality our records are clean, none of us have
prior criminal records. The bail is set impossibly high, and it’s a
humiliating joke because we are poor, we don’t have that kind of money.”
Jun 13, 2017 motherjones.com
Refugees In a Troubled Private Detention Center Are On Hunger Strike
Update (06/12/17, 10:15PM): On Monday morning, guards at the Adelanto
Detention Facility allegedly attacked nine detainees, all members of a
refugee caravan which arrived at the US-Mexico border in May. On Monday
morning, according to two of the caravan organizers, Tristan Call and Alex
Mensing, the group delivered a letter of grievances to prison officials and
demanded a meeting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). At that
point, say Call and Mensing, who spoke with the refugees after the
incident, guards allegedly beat the men, “drenched” them in pepper spray,
handcuffed them, and placed them in restrictive housing. It was then, ICE
claims, that members of the caravan announced their hunger strike. “They
described their shirts as literally being soaked with [pepper spray] and
were forced to shower in hot water,” which intensifies the pain, says
Mensing. “They also beat them and bashed them against a wall, knocking a
dental crown out of one of the guy’s mouth.” Call adds, “They said the
other prisoners shouted for the guards to stop but weren’t able to do
anything.” In a statement e-mailed to Mother Jones this evening, ICE
spokeswoman Virginia Kice said, “Monday morning nine detainees refused to
return to their assigned beds for the morning count, locked arms, and
defied commands to submit to mechanical restraints. After repeated efforts
to avoid confrontation, a supervisory officer used a one-second burst of
pepper spray to subdue the detainees, who immediately complied and submitted
to mechanical restraints. No officers or detainees were injured.” The
facility’s staff has now begun monitoring the strikers’ food intake. Today,
members of a refugee caravan who are seeking asylum in the United States
began a hunger strike at the Adelanto Detention Facility in Southern
California. “We will not eat until the government responds to our demands
and agrees to negotiate,” said Isaac Lopez Castillo, a 27-year-old from El
Salvador who is one of the nine refugees participating in the hunger
strike, in a statement. They are asking for better food, access to clean
water 24 hours a day, and quality medical care. “None of us have prior
criminal records,” they note. Though the hunger strike reportedly began
today at 5:30 in the morning, after speaking with Adelanto Detention
Facility staff, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) spokeswoman
Virginia Kice stated that “there are no detainees at that center who are on
a hunger strike.” The members of the caravan, which arrived at the US-Mexico
border in May, are from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. They fled
their home countries after being targeted by violent criminal
organizations, according to Tristan Call, an organizer with the
Nashville-based immigrant rights group Sureñxs En Acción. “Most of them
have had one or more family members murdered. A lot of them have had direct
physical attacks that they survived themselves, and they’ve had extensive
death threats,” says Call, who accompanied the caravan in Mexico and is
speaking on behalf of the hunger strikers. Under US and international law,
border agents must admit asylum seekers to evaluate whether they have
“credible fear” of returning to their home country. According to Call, at
least seven of the nine hunger strikers have undergone and passed their
“credible fear” interviews, a major hurdle before they may pursue their
asylum cases outside of detention. Yet the caravan members argue that they
are being treated with “humiliation and discrimination” at Adelanto. In
addition to demanding better food and clean water, they want new
uniforms—specifically, underwear that hasn’t been used by other detainees.
The hunger strikers are complaining about unreasonable bond amounts, which
they say have been set at “impossibly high levels.” At least one detainee’s
bail was set at $20,000, says Call. “If you set a $20,000 bond, and you’re
a refugee from El Salvador coming with nothing, there is zero chance you
will be able to do that. It’s essentially similar to the kind of extortion
they were experiencing from the gangs they just fled from: You flee for
your life from a place where you’re being extorted for tens of thousands of
dollars that you can’t pay, and then you have a similar experience with the
US government.” The detainees are also asking for better access to quality
medical care at Adelanto, which is operated by the GEO Group, the country’s
largest private prison company. So far three immigrants have died at the
facility this year. In a July 2015 letter to ICE and federal inspectors, 29
members of Congress requested an investigation into health and safety
concerns at the facility, writing that “egregious” medical errors had
caused a 2012 death there. Four months after the letter was sent, 400
detainees began a hunger strike.
Jun 3, 2017
motherjones.com
In 3 Months, 3 Immigrants Have Died at a Private Detention Center in
California
A Honduran immigrant held at a troubled detention center in
California's high desert died Wednesday night while in the custody of
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Vincente Caceres-Maradiaga, 46,
was receiving treatment for multiple medical conditions while waiting for
an immigration court to decide whether to deport him, according an ICE
statement. He collapsed as he was playing soccer at the detention facility
and died while en route to a local hospital. Caceres-Maradiaga's death is
the latest in a string of fatalities among detainees held at the Adelanto
Detention Facility, which is operated by the GEO Group, the country's
largest private prison company. Three people held at the facility have died
in the last three months, including Osmar Epifanio Gonzalez-Gadba, a
32-year-old Nicaraguan found hanging in his cell on March 22, and Sergio
Alonso Lopez, a Mexican man who died of internal bleeding on April 13 after
spending more than two months in custody. Since it opened in 2011, Adelanto
has faced accusations of insufficient medical care and poor conditions. In
July 2015, 29 members of Congress sent a letter to ICE and federal
inspectors requesting an investigation into health and safety concerns at
the facility. They cited the 2012 death of Fernando Dominguez at the
facility, saying it was the result of "egregious errors" by the
center's medical staff, who did not give him proper medical examinations or
allow him to receive timely off-site treatment. In November 2015, 400
detainees began a hunger strike, demanding better medical and dental care
along with other reforms. The federal government guarantees GEO that a
minimum of 975 immigrants will be held at the facility and pays $111 per
detainee per day. Yet last year, the city of Adelanto, acting as a
middleman between ICE and GEO, made a deal to extend the company's contract
until 2021. The federal government guarantees GEO that a minimum of 975
immigrants will be held at the facility and pays $111 per detainee per day,
according to California state Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens), who has
fought to curtail private immigration detention. After that point, ICE only
has to pay $50 per detainee per day—an incentive to fill more beds. Of
California's four privately run immigration detention centers, three use
local governments as intermediaries between ICE and private prison
companies. On Tuesday, the California senate voted 26-13 to ban such contracts,
supporting a bill that could potentially close Adelanto when its contract
runs out in 2021. The Dignity Not Detention Act, authored by Lara, would
prevent local governments from signing or extending contracts with private
prison companies to detain immigrants starting in 2019. The bill would also
require all in-state facilities that hold ICE detainees, including both
private detention centers and public jails, to meet national standards for
detention conditions—empowering state prosecutors to hold detention center
operators accountable for poor conditions inside their facilities. An
identical bill passed last year but was vetoed by Gov. Jerry Brown. "I
have been troubled by recent reports detailing unsatisfactory conditions
and limited access to counsel in private immigration detention
facilities," Brown wrote in his veto message last September. But he
deferred to the Department of Homeland Security, which was then reviewing
its use of for-profit immigration detention. In that review, the Homeland
Security Advisory Council rejected the ongoing use of private prison
companies to detain immigrants, citing the "inferiority of the private
prison model." Yet since President Donald Trump took office, the
federal government has moved to expand private immigration detention,
signing a $110 million deal with GEO in April to build the first new
immigration detention center under Trump. Nine people have died in ICE
custody in fiscal year 2017, which began October 1. Meanwhile, private
prison stocks have nearly doubled in value since Election Day.
Apr 13, 2016
scpr.org
California state measure calls for end to profit-making immigrant
detention contracts
A new state bill aims to stop California cities and counties from
contracting with private prison companies that detain immigrants, but the
effort is generating pushback from one locality. The high-desert prison
town of Adelanto, a city of roughly 32,000, is home to two jails and one
immigrant detention center. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
contracts with Adelanto for detention space for up to 1,455 immigrants at
$112.50 per detainee, per day. The city, in turn, contracts with The GEO
Group, a private company that runs both the Adelanto Detention Facility and
one of the city’s jails. Adelanto officials sold the building that houses
the detention center, a former state prison, to GEO in 2010. But the city
holds the contract for its operation, and receives a cut of the amount ICE
pays for the service. With the Adelanto facility's daily population
averaging roughly 1,200 and based on the per-diem rate, ICE pays up to
about $4 million a month — and more if the detention center is filled to
its 1,940-detainee capacity. But a bill sponsored by state Sen. Ricardo
Lara (D-Bell Gardens) could put an end to Adelanto's immigrant detention
contract. "For far too long, our immigration system has promoted
profits over people," Lara told KPCC. "The goal is to prohibit
these for-profit companies from profiting off the backs of
immigrants." Cities like Adelanto depend on detention space revenue.
In Adelanto, which nearly went bankrupt last year, City Council member John
“Bug” Woodard, a self-described Tea Party Republican, said the GEO
contracts are vital to the city's economy. "I think a good 25 percent
of our income comes from those jailhouses," Woodard said. "GEO is
an important part of this community, and any idiot up in Sacramento that
would like us not to do business with them, they’ve got their heads where
the sun don’t shine." Adelanto has been fighting to stave off bankruptcy
in recent years. Last year, Woodard championed a new revenue source — an
ordinance that allows medical marijuana cultivation in the city. Proponents
of Lara's detention bill say it would affect four local governments in
California that work with private detention contractors, Adelanto included.
The bill would only bar local governments from working with for-profit
detention contractors; it would not prohibit them from contracting
detention space directly to ICE, as does the Orange County Sheriff's Department,
for example. Immigration authorities have increasingly relied on private
contractors and local governments for space to house immigrants awaiting or
fighting deportation since the early 2000s, when the detainee population
exploded as a result of tighter immigration policies. While its scope seems
limited, the bill would affect many more local-government contracts in
other ways: a provision of the bill would make it mandatory for all
immigrant detention facilities in California to comply with federal
standards guidelines that are now optional. "Even if immigrants are in
public holding facilities, like say with the sheriff or a local police
station, these rules would have to be adhered to, regardless of whether
they are private or public," Lara said. The bill would also make it
easier for immigrants to sue these detention facilities if they believe
their rights are violated. The threat of lawsuits worries the California
State Sheriffs' Association, which opposes the proposal. So does the
possibility of ICE having to move detainees from private-contract
facilities affected by the bill to those that rent space directly to ICE,
as many local jails do. "Some of that workload could potentially fall
on public facilities that are already fairly overcrowded," said Cory
Salzillo, legislative director with the sheriffs' ssociation. The measure
requires approval by both houses of the California Legislature and the
governor's signature before it could take effect. The Senate Judiciary
Committee is set to hear the bill next week.
Feb 4, 2016 vvdailypress.com
Debate over jail location in Adelanto revived
ADELANTO — A renewed debate over the location of a proposed 1,000-bed
jail could hold up a lucrative deal that one official had trumpeted as
officially erasing the city's deficit. The jail plan by private prison
operator GEO Group Inc. returned to the Planning Commission on Tuesday
night to mull GEO-requested tweaks to the development agreement. But
Planning Commissioner Chris Waggener requested the item be revisited next
month. The terms for the facility were initially approved 3-2 by the City
Council in late October even amid concerns that the jail would be situated
just about 1.5 miles from Adelanto High School. On Tuesday, Mayor Rich Kerr
revived an argument he made three months ago in opposition to the plan.
"I can assure you ... there will not be a prison next to the high
school," Kerr said. He had mistakenly believed that the agreement OK'd
in October pushed the jail to a location away from the northeast corner of
Holly and Koala roads, which is also only a half-mile from residential
housing. He and Councilman Charley Glasper shot down the plan at the time.
The Commission had recommended the Council deny the plan because of its
proximity to the school, and Commissioner Joy Jeannette on Tuesday stood
firm in that stance. "I would never vote to have the prison near the
high school," she said. Kerr added that he believed the "Council
will not bend" from forcing GEO to build the jail elsewhere, but the
assumption does not harmonize with last October's vote. Mayor Pro Tem
Jermaine Wright, Councilman Ed Camargo and Councilman John "Bug"
Woodard approved the plan back then, shifting the focus away from the
location and instead toward the extra revenue and police presence provided
by the agreement — even if the jail isn't immediately built. Proposed on
22.16 acres of land, the jail came with the condition that GEO immediately
up its yearly payment to the city from $400,000 to $963,000 and fund one
extra San Bernardino County Sheriff's deputy to patrol the streets,
officials said. If the jail is built, the financial implications grow
stronger. The annual payment will jump to $1.33 million and GEO will fund
another deputy. The company was given two years to pull a permit and afforded
five additional years worth of extensions to find a client. If the company
were to back out, the city's revenue stream and GEO-paid deputies revert to
pre-existing levels. In October, Camargo said the deal was "one
way" to increase law enforcement in the city since "nothing
(else) is knocking on the door." Saying that the deal officially
erased the city's deficit, Wright noted that the jail remained at least 3.5
years from being operational and GEO was agreeable to move it. Yet
Waggenger said Tuesday nothing had been formalized to suggest GEO would
switch locations. The company operates three correctional or immigration
complexes in the city: Desert View, Adelanto East and Adelanto West. Kerr
told the Commission he would fight the jail's venue "tooth and
nail." "I'm not going to put a bunch of cons out there to drool
out the freaking window at our young kids," he said. "It's not
going to happen."
Aug 26, 2015
vvdailypress.com
Immigration detainees denied attorney access, groups say
ADELANTO — Federal immigration officials and
Adelanto Detention Facility contractors over the last two years have
blocked detainee access from attorneys and other visitors who have been
critical of operations there or participated in protests, detainee advocate
groups said Tuesday. The groups made their claims in a letter Monday to
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Florida-based Geo Group Inc.,
which operates the Adelanto Detention Facility. The letter was signed by
representatives of American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Southern
California on behalf of Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in
Confinement (CIVIC) and the Southern Poverty Law Center, with pro bono
support of law firm Sidley Austin LLP. The letter urges ICE and Geo Group
officials to "stop retaliating against visitors who publicly criticize
the U.S. immigration detention system," or prepare to face legal
action. "Over the last two years, the Geo Group and ICE have
established an unlawful pattern and practice of denying attorney access to
clients detained at the facility in retaliation for the attorneys'
participation in lawful, peaceful protests outside of the facility,"
the letter reads, "in contravention of the First Amendment's guarantee
that 'debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and
wide-open.'" ICE officials rebutted the claims Tuesday, saying the
agency was well aware of the importance of ensuring detainees' access to
legal counsel. "ICE is in frequent communication with attorneys and
other stakeholders regarding the operation of its detention facilities and
is continually making adjustments in response to feedback and any concerns
raised," ICE spokeswoman Virginia Kice said in a statement.
"Individuals who fail to comply with the visitation standards
applicable to a particular ICE facility may have their visitation
privileges suspended. Likewise, individuals who misrepresent the purpose of
their visit to such facilities may be denied access." An email inquiry
sent to Geo Group officials Tuesday was not immediately answered. On Aug.
6, 2013, attorney and CIVIC co-executive director Christina Fialho was
reportedly denied access to consult with a prospective client after
participating in a peaceful vigil outside the facility, according to
Monday's letter. After a Geo officer asked her whether she took part in the
vigil, she said she had and then was told her visitation request was
denied. After challenging her denial, Fialho was told by the officer that
she was being denied because she did not have on file a G-28, which is a
notice of appearance as an attorney. But ICE regulations allow for attorney
visits with or without a G-28, the letter said. San Bernardino County
sheriff's deputies arrived soon after to question Fialho at the request of
Geo officers. Fialho was informed that the Geo officers requested she be
removed from the facility or arrested, according to the letter. ICE
officials have said, however, that Fialho and members of CIVIC were
involved in activities that violated ICE detention standards designed to safeguard
detainees' privacy. Officials acknowledged that her visitation privileges
were restored shortly afterward once the issue was resolved. But the letter
also details a reported account from May, when Fialho was again denied
access to consult with existing and prospective clients following a vigil,
despite having confirmed with a deputy three times that the deputy had
advised ICE and Geo officials of the purpose of her visit. "As Ms.
Fialho prepared to leave the facility, she encountered other attorneys whom
she knew but who had not participated in the vigil," the letter reads.
"(A)ll of them had been permitted to visit with clients." She was
then told by a Geo staff member that she could enter the facility should
the other CIVIC members and accompanying families leave the scene. Even
after they left, a Geo staff member shut the door and locked it in Fialho's
face after she attempted multiple times to ask the staff member a question
but was met with resistance and "instructed ... to either enter the
building or leave," the letter said. The confrontation was reportedly
caught on camera. The advocacy groups are demanding ICE and Geo officials
confirm in writing by Sept. 24 that they will cease alleged retaliation and
clarify policies to reflect this vow. Advocacy groups have regularly called
upon ICE and Geo officials to make changes at the facility, citing detainee
deaths and poor conditions. But officials have pushed back against
suggestions of sub-par care, touting the amenities and liberties available to
the 1,255 detainees there during a tour earlier this month.
05/19/2015
huffingtonpost.com
GEO Group Whistleblower Exposes First
Amendment Violations, Lack of Officer Training, and Poor Conditions at the
Adelanto Detention Center A former employee of GEO Group - a corporation
that operates the Adelanto Detention Center - claims First Amendment
violations, lack of proper training for GEO Group staff, extreme work
hours, employee intimidation, and overuse of solitary confinement. The
former employee, who asked to remain anonymous, recounted in a recording on
file with CIVIC that two Muslim men were put into solitary confinement for
quietly saying their daily prayers. He attributed these First Amendment
violations to a complete lack of officer training. "They are not
trained for shit," he said. "I had to learn everything on my own.
They put me in a dorm and then they said, 'Alright. Good luck. See you
later.'" He cited overcrowded conditions and a work culture that
required guards to do back-to-back 12- and 16-hour shifts, or risk being
fired. Despite the lack of training and the extreme over-time hours, he
claims that he was responsible for supervising over 100 detainees on his
own. According to him, he was warned, "If you can't handle it, you
will lose your job." He stated that GEO Group is paid a certain amount
of money from the federal government, but then GEO Group is given unbridled
discretion to "do whatever the hell they want." In his view, this
is not fair to the guards or the detainees. The Adelanto Detention Center,
in San Bernardino, California, is owned and operated by GEO Group, which
contracts with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to imprison
1,300 men on any given day. ICE pays GEO Group up to $111 per person
imprisoned at Adelanto each day. GEO Group is one of the largest private
prison corporations in the United States. According to a compilation of
federal figures by CIVIC, GEO Group receives more taxpayer dollars than any
other ICE contractor. GEO Group's revenues climbed from $1.52 billion in
2013 to $1.69 billion in 2014. Last year, GEO Group began operating family
immigration detention facilities that house juveniles. Yet, they
acknowledge in their most recent annual report that they are unsure whether
they can "minimize the risks and difficulties" involved in
operating juvenile correctional facilities while still "yielding an
attractive profit margin." GEO Group has been the subject of hundreds
of lawsuits, ranging from sexual battery to medical neglect to wrongful
death. In 2011, a U.S. citizen died at a GEO-run immigration detention
facility in England. A jury found that his death was in part due to medical
neglect at the Harmondsworth Removal Centre. A report on Harmondsworth by
Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Prisons in January 2014 found
"shocking cases where a sense of humanity was lost." These cases
included long periods of solitary confinement - particularly for Muslims -
and medical mismanagement. The U.K.'s Home Office ended its contract with
GEO Group that September. Back in the United States, another GEO Group
whistleblower won a wrongful termination lawsuit, after he divulged illegal
activities at a California facility, including sexual and physical assault,
fraud, and mishandled incident reports. Numerous questions about oversight
and accountability have been left unanswered by GEO Group. A government
report found that GEO Group's medical mismanagement at Adelanto directly
led to the death of at least one detainee, Fernando Dominguez, in March
2012. There also are significant questions regarding GEO Group's
responsibility in last month's death of Raul Ernesto Morales-Ramos, also at
Adelanto. Last week, the ACLU of Southern California, CIVIC, and eight
other legal service providers and human rights organizations formally
voiced concerns about the poor quality of health care offered at Adelanto.
Our letter, sent directly to ICE Director Sarah Saldaña and other
government officials, describes abhorrent accounts of medical negligence
and reveals that financial costs form a basis for medical decisions. For
example, GEO Group denied a man treatment for his severe hip infection
because "it was too expensive." The infection ultimately
developed into a life-threatening condition that required a 6-week
hospitalization at an outside hospital not affiliated with GEO Group.
Despite GEO Group's embattled reputation, ICE has announced plans to expand
the available bed space at Adelanto by 640 beds, and for the first time may
house women and LGBTQ individuals at the facility. According to their
annual report, GEO Group expects to generate $21 million in additional
annualized revenue from this expansion. Learn more here and join advocates,
faith leaders, people formerly detained at Adelanto, and family members of
people currently detained on Tuesday, May 19, 2015, (starting at 11 a.m.)
for a vigil and press conference outside of the Adelanto Detention Center
(10400 Rancho Rd, Adelanto, CA).
Feb 28, 2014
vvdailypress.com
SAN BERNARDINO • Attorneys for Geo Group Inc.,
which operates an immigration detention center in Adelanto, were no-shows
in court Tuesday as they face a medical malpractice lawsuit brought forth
by the mother of a Mexican national who died in 2012 of complications from
pneumonia. A government report following the man’s death said “egregious
errors” were made by the facility’s medical staff. Geo Group has denied the
claims levied in the suit, court records show. Fernando Dominguez-Valivia,
58, died March 4, 2012, nearly three weeks after he was transferred to
Victor Valley Hospital from Adelanto Detention Facility East for treatment,
according to previous reports. With a criminal record including forgery and
theft, Dominguez-Valivia originally came into ADF custody on Nov. 23, 2011,
after he had been detained on unspecified charges in the Rancho Cucamonga
area, immigration officials previously said. A U.S. Department of Homeland
Security oversight committee noted in its inspection report of the facility
in September 2012 that Dominguez-Valivia’s death was the first for the facility,
but also preventable. “The investigation disclosed several egregious errors
committed by medical staff, including failure to perform proper physical
examinations in response to symptoms and complaints, failure to pursue any
records critical to continuity of care, and failure to facilitate timely
and appropriate access to off-site treatments,” said the report,
referencing a Detainee Death Review conducted sometime after the man’s
death. The committee concluded “the detainee’s death could have been prevented
and that the detainee received an unacceptable level of medical care while
detained at ACF,” the report reads. San Bernardino County Sheriff-Coroner
spokeswoman Sandy Fatland confirmed Tuesday that Dominguez-Valivia died
naturally of multiorgan failure due to pneumonia, but the committee also
listed alcoholic liver disease and sepsis as causes of death. On Oct. 15,
Geo Group was served with the lawsuit, which listed several plaintiffs
including Dominguez-Valivia’s mother, Juana Lopez. An attempt to reach
Lopez’s attorney on Tuesday was not immediately successful. An email
address provided on the Geo Group’s website for media inquiries could not
receive emails. According to court records, the case is scheduled to be
back in court March 27.
Dec 23, 2013 The
Sun
Carlos Hidalgo planned to go Christmas tree
shopping this past weekend with his two youngest children, Lovette, 16, and
Andrew, 9. “This year, it will be Andrew’s turn to buy the tree,” Hidalgo
said. Last week, Hidalgo, 46, was bracing himself for not being with his
children this Christmas. Earlier last week he was allowed to post $10,000
bond and is now living with his parents in North Hollywood. For about eight
months, Hidalgo was an inmate at the U.S. Immigrations and Customs
Enforcement, or ICE, detention facility in Adelanto. In late November,
three female community college students were arrested at the Adelanto
facility during a protest that focused on getting Hidalgo and two other
inmates out of the privately run detention center and back with their
families for the holidays. Neidi Dominguez, program manager at the
California Youth Immigrant Justice Alliance, said the protest “was one of
many things that led to a decision” by an immigration court judge to allow
Hidalgo to post bail. “Everything played out the way it did because so many
did something to help,” she said. The other two men that the protest sought
to free remained in custody as the weekend commenced, authorities said.
Hidalgo came to the United States from El Salvador with his parents at age
11, graduated from Bell Gardens High School in 1985, attended Cerritos
College in Norwalk for a semester, got married and began working as a loan
processor for a builder and later branched out to doing investigations for
criminal and bankruptcy attorneys. He said his detention in Adelanto was
the result of an arrest for cashing a check from someone who owed him
money. As it turned out, he said, the check he attempted to cash was not
from an account belonging to the man who gave it to him. Life in the
Adelanto detention facility, run by the private company Geo Group for ICE,
is fraught with disease, he said. “Many other prisoners have obvious
illnesses including AIDS, rashes and funguses,” he said. But perhaps the
biggest concern during detention — and one shared by other inmates — is the
fear that he would be awakened in the middle of the night and sent back to
El Salvador, he said. “This has been very hard on the kids,” who also
feared that their father might suddenly be deported, he said. Hidalgo, who
did volunteer work for other Adelanto detainees, said other prisoners were
crying when he left the facility. “I see their families (in my mind). This
has got to stop,” he said. “These are people trying to make a life be
respected for the bread they earn... .America is so compassionate around
the world. Why isn’t it that way here?
Nov 27, 2013
vvdailypress.com
ADELANTO • Three young women were arrested after
they locked themselves to a chain-link fence surrounding the GEO Group Inc.
Adelanto Detention Center during a demonstration on Monday. In May 2011,
the GEO Group contracted with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
through an intergovernmental service agreement with Adelanto to house
federal immigration detainees. San Bernardino County Sheriff’s deputies
arrested Mitzie Perez, 22, of San Dimas, Silvia Dianey Murillo, 20, of
Riverside and Lizeth Montiel, 20, of Upland on charges of trespassing and
vandalism, sheriff’s spokeswoman Jodi Miller said. All three women are part
of the Inland Empire Immigrant Youth Coalition, according to Miller. An
estimated 50 to 100 protesters gathered to bring attention to the
conditions reported inside the facility including allegations of abuse of
detainees, inadequate food and poor medical care, according to Fernando
Romero, spokesman for the Justice for Immigrants Coalition of Inland
Southern California. “We did this action three days before Thanksgiving on
purpose,” Romero said. “The people inside the facility won’t be going home
for the holidays to spend Thanksgiving or Christmas with their families
like you and I will.” The women attached themselves to the fence
surrounding the detention facility using U-lock bicycle locks which they
placed around their necks. “The fire department had to cut the fence to remove
the women,” Miller said. “That’s where the vandalism charge came from.” No
other demonstraters were arrested, Warden Neil Clark said. “We asked that
they (Perez, Murillo and Montiel) be removed for trespassing,” Clark said.
“Other than the three who chained themselves to the fence, it was a
peaceful protest.” Approximately 25 law enforcement officers monitored the
protest and informed the group, in both English and Spanish, that they were
trespassing on private property and they needed to disperse. All of the
demonstrators, with exception of the three women, complied, Miller said.
Romero said Perez and Murillo are undocumented and knew the risk involved
in Monday’s demonstration. “The women are sacrificing their bodies, their
livelihood and exposing themselves to separation from their families to
make a point,” Romero said. “We want to highlight the injustices ... there
are a lot of people who don’t belong there,” Romero said. “There are other
solutions to detention. We want to stop the unjust deportations.” Perez,
Murillo and Montiel were booked at the West Valley Detention Center, Miller
said.
November 26, 2011 The Daily Press
The state has canceled its contract with the privately operated Desert
View Modified Community Correctional Facility, putting about 150 workers
out of a job. Desert View's contract termination officially takes effect
Wednesday, though prison employees told the Daily Press that The Geo Group
Inc. has been preparing to deactivate the prison at Rancho and Aster roads
since May. The 643-bed medium-security prison is shuttering its doors as
part of California’s realignment plan, which responds to federal orders to
reduce state prison overcrowding by shifting responsibility for tens of
thousands of low-level offenders to county governments. To help deal with
the new influx of inmates under local supervision, the California
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is encouraging counties to
enter into their own contracts with more than a dozen former CCFs. The CCFs
had generally housed inmates with sentences shorter than 18 months, parole
violators and offenders with scheduled release dates — the same types of
nonviolent, non-sexual or non-serious offenders now serving out sentences
in county jails instead of state prisons. “We hope that counties contract
with these facilities to save jobs and ease inmate housing concerns that
many counties may have,” CDCR spokeswoman Dana Toyama said. But San
Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department officials say they’re not planning
to privatize jail beds. The math just doesn’t pencil out, according to
Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Cindy Bachman. “The issue with taking
advantage of private prisons or private jail facilities has come up over
and over again throughout the years; however, it’s not something that the
county is considering,” Bachman said. “It’s too costly and there’s just not
the funding really even to consider something like that.” The California
State Association of Counties has created a document outlining potential
beds at the former CCFs, but counties statewide have been hesitant to
exercise that option. The Geo Group had operated six of the nine privately
run CCFs that lost their state contracts, according to CSAC. Five other
CCFs were run by local governments. The facilities ranged from around 100
employees to more than 600, according to Toyama.
October 11, 2011 Daily Press
State water quality control officials unnerved city leaders in January by
calling for a ban on new sewer connections in Adelanto in the name of
protecting public health. State officials had accused the city of violating
orders to bring its treatment plant into compliance, making unauthorized
wastewater discharges and exceeding its storage pond capacity. In March and
again in May, city officials managed to dodge the proposed ban — a move
they say would've halted new development, including a new housing tract by
D.R. Horton, a planned new prison facility by The Geo Group and an
expansion to the county jail. To keep the ban at bay, city officials on
Wednesday will try to convince the Lahontan Region's state water board
they've made significant progress in cleaning up their wastewater act at a
meeting in Victorville. They must prove the Adelanto Public Utilities
Authority has sufficient disposal capacity to handle current and increased
wastewater flows.
July 17, 2010 Daily Press
Some 100 city prison employees will be out of a job for at least the next
several months, since the private operator that bought the city-owned
prison for $28 million has yet to land a government contract. The employees
of the Adelanto Community Correctional Facility were officially laid off
June 4, but city officials agreed to pay them through Aug. 4, in hopes that
private prison operator GEO Group, Inc. would land a state or federal
contract and quickly rehire them. In mid-May the inmates at the 650-bed
correctional facility were transferred out, with GEO Group planning to
close it and complete renovations over the summer. Now it’s estimated the
renovations will take four to six months, Adelanto City Manager Jim Hart
said. It’s also unclear when the Florida-based operator will secure a
contract for the prison, on Rancho Road west of Highway 395. “My entire
intentions and efforts were to have it set up so that the employees would
be able to transition from city employment to GEO employment,” Hart said.
“Our hope that there wouldn’t be a gap between when they’re paid and when
they get picked up, I think, is now dwindling because it doesn’t appear
that GEO will have the renovations done in time to get opened.”
Allen Correctional Center,
Kinder, Louisiana
Aug 15, 2017 nola.com
Nonprofit law firm sues Louisiana prison for info on who's held in
segregated housing
The MacArthur Justice Center is suing a Louisiana prison for records
that show who is being held in segregated housing, the nonprofit law firm
announced Monday (Aug. 14). The suit was filed late last week after Allen
Correctional Center, a privately-run prison that houses inmates from across
the state, allegedly ignored repeated requests for public records,
according to the Roderick and Solange MacArthur Justice Center. The
nonprofit firm, which has an office in New Orleans, submitted a
public-records request June 19 for the names and offender ID numbers of
inmates kept in various types of segregated housing at Allen, according to
the lawsuit. The prison received the request, directed to Warden Keith
Cooley, by certified mail June 22, the lawsuit states. Louisiana law allows
five days for information to be provided in response to such an inquiry.
Nearly two months after the original request was submitted, the MacArthur
Justice Center has not received the information -- or a timeline for when
the documents will be made available, prompting the civil lawsuit against
Allen Correctional Center Warden Keith Cooley, the MacArthur center said in
a news release. The lawsuit notes that a follow-up inquiry into the request
was sent July 12, both by fax and certified mail. "All we want to know is who they are
holding in solitary confinement and segregated housing," said Katie
Schwartzmann, co-director of the center's New Orleans office. "The
Warden is illegally obstructing our inquiry and we are now seeking a court
assistance." The MacArthur center requested the information as part of
a joint project looking at the use and conditions of segregated housing
units in prisons across Louisiana, Schwartzmann said. The firm submitted
similar requests for records to prisons throughout the state, but Allen
Correctional Center was the only prison that did not comply, she said. The
lawsuit, filed in Allen Parish, asks a court to order release of the
records and seeks an expedited hearing on the matter. The lawsuit is also
seeking penalties for violation of state public-records law, including
sanctions and attorneys' fees for having to bring the litigation, which the
lawsuit contends should have been resolved without court intervention or
attorney time. "The public's ability to inspect public records is a
critical to holding the government - and its private contractors -
accountable for how they manage public resources," Schwartzmann said.
Allen Correctional Center is run by The GEO Group, a private contractor for
the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections. However, the
Florida-based company, which owns or manages prisons across the country,
announced last week that it plans to end its management of Allen at the end
of August. Warden Keith Cooley was not immediately available for comment
Monday evening. An attempt to reach The GEO Group for comment was
unsuccessful. Though Schwartzmann declined to give details on why the
MacArthur Justice Center is seeking the records, she said the center is
"very concerned" about excessive use of segregated housing in
Louisiana prisons. Segregated housing, or specialized areas of prisons used
to house particular prisoners apart from the general population, is used
for various reasons, including both disciplinary and protective. Recent
years have seen a trend away from use of segregated housing, which includes
solitary confinement but can include cellmates in some situations,
Schwartzmann said. Segregated
housing often involves restricted access to services, privileges and
everyday prison routines, such as outdoor exercise, phone use and social
interactions. The practice has been shown to cause "very significant
damage" to prisoners, she said. In July, the MacArthur Justice Center
filed a federal lawsuit against another Louisiana prison, David Wade Correctional
Center in Homer, arguing that the prison "deliberately impeded an
investigation into allegations of serious neglect and abuse of prisoners
with disabilities" by not allowing government-designated advocates to
tour segregated housing for prisoners with disabilities.Lawsuit: Prisoners
may have been forced to bark for food.
Prison officials prevented advocates from interviewing inmates and
staff members, the lawsuit claims. The lawsuit was also brought by the
nonprofit Advocacy Center of Louisiana, which serves as the state's
protection and advocacy system to protect the rights of people with mental
or physical disabilities.The MacArthur Justice Center is the same firm
representing inmates whose lawsuit led to the Orleans Parish Sheriff's
Office federal consent decree over conditions at the jail.
Jun 27, 2017 kplctv.com
GEO Group terminates contract with Allen Correctional Center
GEO, the private managing company of Allen Correctional Center, is
pulling their management contract with the facility beginning Aug. 20. The
relationship the town of Kinder has with the correctional center runs deep,
from employment to partnerships, and many say they're shocked by the sudden
question regarding the facility's future. "We really didn't know what
was going on, we heard rumors but nothing concrete," said Kinder Mayor
Wayland LaFargue. He said he was notified of GEO's plan to end their
management contract with the state-funded facility this past Thursday. In a
statement from the company, GEO cited state budgetary constraints. The
center has been operating as a jail facility for a year, which the company
said they hoped was temporary. “We’re proud to have been able to partner
with the Louisiana Department of Corrections to provide high quality
management services at the state-owned Allen Correctional Center over the
last two decades. Due to state budgetary constraints, over the last year,
the Center has been operating as a jail facility, which we had hoped would
be temporary. Unfortunately, continued state budgetary constraints will not
support returning the Center to a full service correctional facility with
robust rehabilitation programs, and therefore, we have regrettably reached
the decision to discontinue our management contract at the Allen
Correctional Center. We appreciate the partnership and support of the
Louisiana Department of Corrections over the last two decades, and we are
committed to ensuring a smooth transition as our management tenure ends at
the Center at the end of August.”
This still raises major concerns for the parish and the town of
Kinder. "GEO is probably the third largest employer for Allen Parish
and it's going to affect our community dramatically with revenue and
utilities," said LaFargue. "People don't realize the utilities
they use. The employees...where are they going to go? I'm guessing 200 some
have been there 20-plus years, that's devastating to a family."
LaFargue said the correctional center also provides the town with grass
cutting services and help with work on area schools. "They've been
very good to us, but this short notice and hearing this, everybody's
scrambling to find out what lies ahead in the future for us." The
State Department of Corrections says its intentions are to maintain a
facility at Allen Correctional Center, however, nothing is definitive at
this time. "I hope something transpires in the next few months. I hope
someone takes it over. That's the big problem. If we can solve that
problem, it means a lot to Allen Parish and Kinder." The Department of
Public Safety and Corrections says it will meet within a week to review
available options.
Allen Correctional
Center
Feb 20, 2016 nola.com
Louisiana considering closing 2 prisons in budget cuts
The Louisiana Department of Corrections is considering closing two
privately operated prisons as it tries to cut $14.1 million in spending to
help close the state's $940 million budget shortfall. Winn Correctional
Center and Allen Correctional Center, are operated by two separate
companies. The two closures would save an estimated $4.6 million. Another option the Department of
Corrections is floating -- and the one the department most prefers -- is to
temporarily reduce the rate the state pays the two companies that operate
Winn and Allen prisons, for a savings of $2.6 million. But under that
scenario, the Department of Corrections would also need to temporarily
reduce the rate it pays per prisoner to house inmates in jails operated by
sheriffs. There is significant risk in closing the two prisons because many
of the 1,000 prisoners housed there are unable to be transferred to local
facilities because of mental health or debilitating illnesses or because
the prisoner is in a special disciplinary unit. "This is going to
eventually saturate an already saturated staff, especially as it relates to
medical and mental health," Department of Corrections Secretary Jimmy
LeBlanc told House Appropriations members on Friday (Feb. 19). "It
means we'll probably have to let people out of cells that probably should
still be in cells and put them in the general population, which will drive
up inmate assaults and inmate-on-staff assaults." The proposal for the
two private operators of the prisons, LaSalle Southwest Corrections and the
GEO Group, sets up a difficult ultimatum: Either accept the lower per-prisoner
pay rate or face total shutdown. The department currently pays $31.52 per
day; the local rate the department wants to pay is $24.39 per day.
Legislators will need to approve new appropriations to pay the lowered
rate. After the hearing, LeBlanc said that the department has been in
communications about the possibility of lower pay rates, but hasn't
received word back that LaSalle or GEO would accept the new payment
structure. "I've talked to
LaSalle and got a response in writing, and I think it's been
positive," LeBlanc said. "GEO we've not heard a definite
yet." In addition to the budget cuts, LeBlanc said the department is
having difficulty paying for the upkeep of prisons statewide. There are
broken windows that need to be fixed and other maintenance issues, he said,
that will have to be delayed under the current budget cuts. "This is a
business where you're only one phone call away from disaster," LeBlanc
said. "It's going to be a significant strain on our prisons to take that kind
of cut at the end of the year."
Feb 18, 2016
louisianarecord.com
Former Allen Correctional Center inmate sues operators for alleged
denial of medical care
LAFAYETTE – An inmate previously confined at Allen Correctional Center
is taking the center's operator to court after allegedly suffering an
injury when a ceiling tile fell on him. Ben Thompson filed a suit on Feb.
12 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana,
Lafayette Division against The Geo Group, for alleged breach of duties and
violations of his rights. Thompson was formerly at the Allen Correctional
Center, which is operated and owned by The Geo Group. He was allegedly
incarcerated at the facility since April 2012 and until the time of the
incident, and is now currently at the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center in
Iberville Parish, the suit states. He alleges that many employees and
inmates had complained about the conditions of the Allen facility but
defendant allegedly ignored such complaints. On or about Feb. 12, 2015,
Thompson was acting as a peer-facilitator in a substance abuse class when a
ceiling tile fell 12 feet and struck him on the middle of his neck on the
posterior side, the suit states. Thompson claims to have immediately felt a
shocking sensation and instantaneous pain but was allegedly given only
ibuprofen. Thompson alleges that the pain did not subside on Feb. 15, 2015,
but was again allegedly given only ibuprofen when he sought treatment. On
March 11, 2015, Thompson allegedly was given a CT scan and on March 20, a
doctor at Allen recommended that plaintiff be observed by a neuro or
orthopedic surgeon for appropriate diagnosis. The defendant allegedly
denied such recommendations. The defendant also allegedly denied an
administrative remedy procedure complaint made by the plaintiff on March 8,
2015. Thompson claims that as a result of defendant’s actions and unlawful
disregard to his rights for medical treatment, he continues to suffer
physical injury to his cervical spine and neck. He is now suing for access
to reasonable medical care and treatment for his injuries, compensatory
general and special damages, punitive damages, attorneys' fees, cost of the
suit, and any other relief deemed just. He is represented by Gabe A. Duhon,
James S. Broussard and Wyman E. Bankston from Abbeville. U.S. District
Court for the Western District of Louisiana Case number 6:16-cv-00208
February 9, 2011 The Advocate
The Jindal administration is asking companies to detail how much they would
charge the state to care for inmates in Allen and Winn parishes if two
state prisons are sold to ease budget problems. Responses to the Request
For Information, or RFI, are due Friday as part of a possible move toward
selling the correctional centers. Private companies oversee Winn
Correctional Center in Atlanta, La., and Allen Correctional Center in
Kinder. Winn is managed by Corrections Corporation of America while Global
Expertise in Outsourcing, Inc. operates Allen. Selling the prisons is still
just a possibility at this point. However, a sale would force the state to
pay the new owners for the care of inmates at the medium security centers.
Some elected officials are nervous about how much the state would end up
paying. Michael DiResto, spokesman for the Division of Administration, said
Wednesday that the RFI is “for planning and information gathering
purposes.”
February 3, 2009 The Town Talk
The three men who escaped from the Allen Correctional Center in Kinder
Jan. 26 have been charged with aggravated escape and are back in the
custody of the Department of Corrections. Cecil Stratton, the last of the
three men to be apprehended, went before a judge Tuesday morning for a
brief court appearance before he was released back to the custody of
Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections. The other two escapees
– Troy Hargrave and Daniel Reeder – were both charged Friday with
aggravated escape and turned over to state custody.
January 29, 2009 The Town Talk
Fatigue, cold and hunger led one of three Allen Parish prison escapees
to turn himself in Wednesday, authorities said. Law enforcement officers
have two of the three men, who escaped Monday from the Allen Correctional
Center in Kinder, in custody. Federal, state and local law enforcement
agencies say they are turning up the heat on the third escaped convict, who
remains on the loose. "We are working around the clock to locate Cecil
Stratton," Deputy U.S. Marshal Corey Britt said. "And anyone who
assists Cecil will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law."
Stratton -- who was serving a 25-year sentence for convictions of simple
escape, simple burglary, first-degree robbery, marijuana possession, felony
theft and flight from an officer out of St. Mary Parish -- is the only
escapee who has not been captured. Escapees Daniel Reeder and Troy Hargrave
-- both serving sentences for manslaughter convictions -- are back in
police custody.
January 27, 2009 The Advertiser
A prison guard has been booked with helping three dangerous inmates escape
from the privately run state prison in Kinder, the Allen Parish Sheriff’s
Office said Tuesday. Detective Peggy Kennedy said Jesse Jordan, 19, of
Glenmora was held without bond after being booked Monday night on three
counts of assisting escape and one of malfeasance in office. He had worked
there as a guard since May, Chief Deputy Grant Willis said. “It appears the
motivation on his part was for monetary value,” Willis said. He said Jordan
was cooperating with investigators. Jordan was employed by GEO — Global
Expertise in Outsourcing Inc., the private company that runs the prison,
Kennedy said. A call to the prison was not immediately returned. Daniel
Reeder, 24, of Shreveport, Troy Hargrave, 32, of Crowley, and Cecil
Stratton, 29, of Berwick were missing at the 6 a.m. head count, prison
officials said. They described all three as dangerous and said Reeder and
Hargrave were serving time for manslaughter. Three rows of razor wire on
the ground in front of the fence had been cut through, but neither the
fence nor the razor wire on top of it had been cut, Willis said. “We can’t
say for certain that’s the way they got out, or whether it was a decoy,” he
said.
January 27, 2009 The Town Talk
Three inmates -- two of whom were serving time for manslaughter -- escaped
from a correctional center in Kinder sometime before 6 a.m. Monday, prison
officials reported. Authorities from the Allen Correctional Center in
Kinder said the three men should be considered dangerous. Officials are
asking anyone with information or anyone who sees the escapees to contact
their local authorities or call 911. The three men were discovered missing
when the facility conducted its 6 a.m. count. The escapees were identified
as: Daniel Reeder, a 24-year-old white man, 5 feet, 6 inches tall and 140
pounds with brown hair. He was serving a 30-year sentence for a manslaughter
conviction in Caddo Parish. Troy Hargrave, a 32-year-old white man, 5 feet,
9 inches tall and 203 pounds with blond hair. He was serving a 40-year
sentence for a manslaughter conviction in Calcasieu Parish. Cecil Stratton,
a 29-year-old white man, 6 feet, 1 inch tall and 185 pounds with balding
brown hair. He was serving a 25-year sentence for convictions of simple
escape, simple burglary, first-degree robbery, marijuana possession, felony
theft and flight from an officer out of St. Mary Parish. In addition to the
three offenders, the facility is listing Sidonia Marie Stratton of Morgan
City as a person of interest in the incident. She is the sister of Cecil
Stratton and is thought to be driving a beige 1998 Mercury Sable with
license plate OZK138. The dress code for offenders at Allen Correctional
Center is navy blue scrubs with a white undershirt or blue jeans, a
blue-jean button-up shirt or gray sweatshirt, but it is not confirmed what
the men were wearing when they escaped. Security and K-9 teams from the
correctional center are working with local law enforcement in Allen Parish
and surrounding parishes to track down the three escaped inmates. The local
community has been notified of the escape, as is standard in these
situations, officials said. Allen Parish Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy
Grant Willis said the Sheriff's Office is assisting in the search efforts.
According to a release from the facility, Hargrave may have family in the
Jennings, Kinder and Lake Arthur areas. Jennifer Allemand, programs manager
for the GEO Group facility, said the three men were state Department of
Corrections inmates who were housed in the medium-custody private prison.
March 15, 2007 KPLC TV
It was between two and three in the afternoon Wednesday when Brian Scott escaped
from the Allen Correctional Center by scaling the fence. Scott is convicted
of felony theft and as a fugitive was considered dangerous. The prison is a
medium security state facility but is operated by a private company, the
Geo Group. Warden Terry Terrell says, with the help of numerous law
enforcement agencies, procedures were put in effect to identify the missing
inmate and get a manhunt underway to capture him. "I don't know that
you could get out of a situation any better than what we did. The inmate
was apprehended. Neither he nor anyone in law enforcement was injured so we
are very thankful for that. " In such cases they notify those who live
near the prison, that is if they've signed up to be notified when there's
an escape. "About once a year and sometimes more frequently we put out
flyers to all the local residents that we're aware of and ask them if they
do wish to be contacted in a similar circumstance to simply fill out the
form and name a number so we can put them on the calling list," says
Terrell. But people who live near the prison such as in this area called
Hickory Flat say they need to do a better job of alerting the public when
an inmate escapes. Explains Virgil Richard, "We're taxpayers. Why
can't they burn a little gas and let us know something. They were supposed
to have had a horn, an alarm system and we don't have that." Neighbor
Lloyd Miles agrees. "We've got some elderly people here and some
handicapped people here by themselves and I'm mostly concerned about them.
And we got kids."
October
23, 2002
Few concerned citizens ventured out to Alexandria City Hall Tuesday evening
to speak out on the escape and fatal shooting of an HIV-positive state
inmate. But those who attended were vocal in their questions and
suggestions for the Department of Corrections and the Allen Correctional
Center in Kinder. The committee did not make any recommendations concerning
the escape or policies of the Department of Corrections or Wackenhut Corp.,
which owns Allen Correctional Center in Kinder. Cotton, 43, of Houma,
escaped Aug. 21 from his room at the hospital. Thirty-eight hours later, he
was shot while hiding underneath a home. Cotton snatched a .357-caliber
handgun from the lone female guard assigned to him when she bent down to
unshackle him so he could use the restroom, police said. (Daily Town Talk)
Alutiiq Security and Technology,
Alaska
December 10, 2004 News & Observer
We commend your excellent Nov. 30 editorial and
the fine investigative report on Nov. 28 on the award of no-bid deals to
Alaska Native Corporations such as Alutiiq Security and Technology. We
endorse your call for urgent scrutiny of this system and the back-door
access it affords major defense contractors like Wackenhut Corp. to gain
lucrative federal work by teaming with Alutiiq as a subcontractor. Your
reporters quoted an Army spokesman who said that Alutiiq, with little
experience in security, would have been unlikely to win the contract on its
own. But it gets even worse: Wackenhut was a failed bidder in the second
phase of contracts which were competitively awarded. Only in this perverse
"system within a system" can two losers become a winner. If
companies like Wackenhut can skirt competitive bidding processes, taxpayers
can have little confidence that we are getting value for money -- in this
case up to half a billion dollars Bill Ragen Deputy Director, Building
Services Division, Service Employees International Union Washington.
Aurora ICE
Processing Center
Oct 20, 2022 cpr.org
Federal judge rules GEO Group — which
runs an ICE detention center in Aurora — can’t be shielded from
class-action lawsuit
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing
facility in Aurora run by private contractor GEO, on Monday July 1, 2019. A
federal court ruling has paved the way for a class-action lawsuit to
proceed against a private company that owns and operates detention
facilities across the U.S. — including one in Aurora. The GEO Group argued
in the case that it was protected under a federal law that protects
government contractors from facing lawsuits while carrying out federal
directives. The U.S. District Court of Colorado determined that GEO could not
benefit from that law. Court documents also showed that the judge ruled
that GEO had not performed what was directed by U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement and went beyond its contract in requiring detainees to
perform certain tasks like cleaning the commons area. “The record shows
that GEO has not simply performed as ICE directed,” wrote Senior U.S.
District Judge John L. Kane. “GEO went beyond its contract with ICE in
requiring detainees to clean up all common areas and after other detainees
under the threat of segregation.” The court also denied the motion to
decertify a 40,000-person lawsuit against GEO alleging forced labor and
unjust enrichment. The court ruling is the latest of several ongoing issues
with the Aurora facility. Federal immigration officials say a Nicaraguan
man died Friday while in ICE custody at the Aurora Facility. Melvin Ariel
Calero-Mendoza had been at the detention center since May and was awaiting
proceedings to remove him from the country. The 39-year-old was hospitalized
at the University of Colorado Hospital before he died. His cause of death
is under investigation. It is the third death at the facility in four
decades.
Apr 14, 2022
coloradosun.com
Racial discrimination, excessive
force, retaliation alleged at ICE detention center in Aurora The complaint,
filed by three immigrant rights organizations, could spark an investigation
or cause the GEO-run Denver Contract Detention Facility to shut down.
Immigrant rights organizations have filed a
complaint with the Department of Homeland Security alleging racial
discrimination and excessive use of force against two Black immigrants at
the Denver Contract Detention Facility in Aurora. (Olivia Sun, The Colorado
Sun via Report for America) Three immigrant rights organizations have filed
a complaint with the Department of Homeland Security alleging racial
discrimination, retaliation and excessive use of force against two Black
immigrants housed at the Denver Contract Detention Facility in Aurora. The
complaint, filed by the American Immigration Council, Immigrant Justice
Idaho and Immigration Equality, alleges that two detention center guards
have violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits racial
discrimination; the First Amendment of the Constitution; and a manual that
outlines detention standards followed by Immigration and Customs
Enforcement, which is responsible for people held at the facility. The
complaint is centered on two Black detainees, identified by the pseudonyms
"James" and "Musa," because of potential for
retaliation. The complaint alleges that two guards whose last names are
Perry and Alvarez have engaged in egregious behavior that has violated the
civil rights of James and Musa and other Black detainees. The complaint does include the
nationalities of Musa and James, but Wolf said, they are seeking asylum or
protection from torture in their home countries. In the U.S., people held
at the detention center are typically awaiting hearings in immigration
court. The immigrant rights organizations are demanding that ICE remove
James and Musa from the detention center after an investigation into
Alvarez and Perry. The complaint also asks for an investigation into any
other claims of racial discrimination at the center, the firing of any
staff member found to have used excessive force there, and the termination
of any employees who have violated the civil or constitutional rights of
detained people at the facility. If a pattern of those practices is found,
the complaint also asks that corrective measures be instituted by the GEO
Group, the company contracted by ICE to operate the Aurora facility. The
immigrant rights organizations have not ruled out filing a lawsuit.
"What is the most disturbing to me is the level to which the
individuals involved did not seem to be concerned at all about what they
were saying," Rebekah Wolf, policy counsel for the American
Immigration Council, said during an interview. "They clearly thought
it was completely fine - that there would not be any repercussions for using
clear, overt, racist language and inappropriate excessive force against
Black detainees. I can't say that surprised me, but it certainly stood out
to me." A woman who answered the phone at The GEO Group would not
comment about the complaint. She said the reporter must contact the ICE
Denver Field Office for comment. Alethea Smock, director of communications
for ICE's northwest region, said the organization had not received the
complaint. The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond
to a request for comment. James, who has been detained at the Aurora
facility for more than two years, said he has been a victim of excessive
use of force by facility officers, has witnessed anti-Black racism and was
subjected to excessive searches and pat-downs. In an affidavit accompanying
the complaint, James recounted multiple instances when Perry made racist
remarks in his presence, including asking detainees if they knew the
difference between an elevator and a Black man. The difference, Perry said,
is that an elevator can raise a child. Another time Perry said to James,
"When a white baby dies, he becomes an angel, but when a Black baby
dies, he becomes a bat." James said in the complaint that he once saw
Perry once make a hand gesture that he believes is a sign used by members
of The 211 Crew, a white supremacist prison gang. Last summer, when Alvarez
was promoted to sergeant, he was in charge of the unit where James is
housed. After Alvarez' promotion, officers began searching cells around
four times per week, an increase from the former policy of searching once
or twice per month. The increase in searches abruptly halted at the
beginning of this year. James said he was physically assaulted by Alvarez
during a cell search in December. James stated that Alvarez used disrespectful
language and told him to "Get the (expletive) out" of his cell.
Alvarez then twice sprayed James with pepper spray. Two other officers
tackled James to the ground. "As the officers were tackling me, I felt
like something tore in my right foot," James said. "I injured my
right foot a while back and I was scared that the officers grabbing me and
pushing me to the floor made the injury worse. Officer Perry got on top of
me and started squeezing my neck and head. At some point while the officers
held me down, Sergeant Alvarez lifted my dreadlock from my face and pepper
sprayed me again." Unable to walk because of the injury to his foot,
James was handcuffed and brought to the medical unit in a wheelchair.
Officers also brought three other Black men to the medical unit.
"These men were nearby when the officers attacked me," James
said. "However, the men did not do anything wrong. Despite that, all
four of us were placed in disciplinary segregation." Following an
investigation by Aurora facility staff, James was accused of assaulting a
staff member, endangering the people or safety of the facility and refusing
to obey a direct order. Alvarez submitted an incident report, stating that
he pepper sprayed James, because James threatened him. James said he asked
another officer to view a video recording of the incident to confirm he had
not threatened Alvarez. "It was concluded that I did not violate Code
108 (assault on staff member)," James says in the complaint. James
spent two weeks in solitary confinement, and he lost the job he had at the
facility as a result. A few months later, in early March, James said he saw
Alvarez attack another Black person. The man was standing near other people
who were complaining that they wanted more time in the yard. This angered
Alvarez, who grabbed the Black man and then twisted his arms behind his
back. Alvarez pushed the man's face against the wall, before another
officer pulled Alvarez off of the man. The incident occurred in an open
area outside of people's cells. Many other detained people witnessed the
incident, James said. "I believe that the treatment to which Black
people are subjected at Aurora, is racist and unjust," James said.
"I am making this affidavit to bring the behavior of Sergeant Alvarez
and Officer Perry to the public and
agency attention and raise awareness of these alarming issues." U.S.
scales back in other detention facilities The Aurora complaint was filed
just after ICE announced it is planning to close and scale back other
detention facilities because of similar problems. The Etowah County
Detention Center in Gadsden, Alabama, will close due to the "quantity,
severity, diversity and persistence of deficiencies" there. ICE will
also close Glades County Detention Center in Moore Haven, Florida, where
there have been ongoing concerns related to medical care at the facility. A
group of lawmakers said Glades should be closed after complaints surfaced
about racist abuse against Black people detained there. ICE will also
reduce the number of beds at the Alamance County Detention Facility in
Graham, North Carolina, and the Winn Correctional Center in Winnfield,
Louisiana, citing in part a reduced number of detainees, according to
Reuters. In February, the American Immigration Council filed a different complaint
against the Aurora facility, for poor health standards that resulted in a
COVID-19 outbreak inside the facility. According to the complaint, the
facility had not provided sufficient opportunities for vaccination, did not
enforce mask-wearing rules for staff, did not provide enough cleaning
supplies and was neglecting the medical needs of people detained there.
"We received acknowledgement of the complaint but it has not moved
further than that," Wolf said. More than 20,000 people were detained
across the U.S. on March 27, according to Syracuse University, which
maintains a database of immigration detention statistics. "The
allegations against these officers are deeply troubling," said Kaylin
Dines, communications director for Rep. Jason Crow. "Congressman Crow
has a long record of holding this detention center accountable - including
providing weekly reports on the facility to ensure full transparency with
our community. Our office is looking into this disturbing complaint."
There is "very little" oversight of ICE and its immigrant
detention centers, Wolf said. For example, The Department of Homeland
Security's Office of Inspector General, one of the internal divisions that
reviews conduct and conditions at ICE detention centers, released one of
the most scathing reports on a detention center that Wolf's organization
has ever seen. The report cited sanitation-related concerns and security
lapses at Torrance County Detention Center in Estancia, New Mexico, and
called for removing people detained there, with congressional offices
supporting the demand, she said. "And they're at an impasse,"
Wolf said. "Because there's no enforcement mechanism that the OIG
(Office of Inspector General) can use. No one can order ICE to close it,
except for DHS (the Department of Homeland Security). So that's a real gap
in our system of checks and balances where the Department of Homeland
Security and ICE are really working out on an island of their own."
The most recent complaint her organization co-filed against the Aurora facility
in late March could cause the Department of Homeland Security to conduct an
investigation or close down the facility, Wolf said. "One report, one
investigation, seems a little bit like a drop in the bucket, but continuing
to shed light on what these facilities really look like and seem like and
what happens in them, is important to us about the broader conversation
about immigration detention," Wolf said. Another complaint, Musa has
been detained at the Aurora detention facility for a year and is seeking a
green card. He has several mental health diagnoses that have been
exacerbated during his time at the detention facility, he said. "Alvarez and Perry are best friends
and work as a team to bother me," Musa says in the complaint.
"When Perry starts harassing me, Alvarez backs him up." According
to the complaint, Perry calls Musa a zookeeper. "I believe that he
calls me a zookeeper because I'm African and Africa is known to have wild
animals," Musa said. "As soon as I see him, I go to my room to
avoid having problems with him and getting in trouble." Musa said
Perry has made so many racist comments in front of him that he said he
can't keep track of the incidents. Musa said he witnessed Perry calling an
Iranian detainee "an RPG," a rocket-propelled grenade, which Wolf
said is a derogatory term for people of Middle Eastern descent. In one
incident, Musa said he was placed in handcuffs that were so tight, his
hands became numb." After an hour of wearing the handcuffs, Musa asked
to see a psychiatrist. He was taken to solitary confinement, and after
three days, he sat in front of a disciplinary board, which said he should
serve 72 hours in disciplinary segregation, but that they would honor his
time already served there.
"However, an officer took me back to solitary confinement
anyway," Musa said in the complaint. He stayed in confinement for nine
days, where he went on a hunger strike for six of those days. When he was
taken to a psychiatrist, the doctor told Musa to focus on getting out of
lockdown. A few weeks after Musa was released from solitary confinement, he
was interviewed by CBS News and the Spanish-speaking news organization
Telemundo, about how officers refused to give detainees COVID-19 tests.
After the CBS interview, Alvarez told Musa, "it would come back to
me," which Musa perceived as a threat. In January, Musa was sitting at
a table preparing to eat when Perry walked into the area. Musa went back to
his room and closed the door to avoid an altercation. Perry came to Musa's
door and banged on it, startling Musa, who hit his head on the top bunk
above him. Perry saw Musa, startled, through the window in the door. Perry
laughed and then walked away. "The incident triggered my PTSD, so I
went to talk to the psychiatrist," Musa said. The psychiatrist wrote a
letter that day to the administration of the detention center saying Perry
and Alvarez were intentionally triggering Musa's PTSD, according to the
complaint. The psychiatrist said the letter might help to "prevent
further misunderstanding" but that the doctor would get in trouble for
writing it. Later that day, another detained person told Musa that he saw
Perry putting his ungloved hands in Musa's food. A Black officer promised
that someone would reprimand Perry. Since then, Musa has seen Perry a few
times. "Once in the hallway, he pinched his nose, as if to say that I
stink," Musa said. "I am worried I will have a mental
breakdown," he said. "Every time someone has a breakdown, it's
not guaranteed that they will come back the same. I am scared because I
have seen what Alvarez and Perry can do - choking, pepper spraying and
beating. When other officers see them doing something like this, they don't
ask what's going on to try to de-escalate. They just join in." Musa
said he doesn't want to continue complaining at the detention facility
because he fears Alvarez will retaliate by beating or Tasing him. "But
I want to submit my affidavit because this is America," he said.
"Somebody has to stand up for what is right."
Feb 23, 2022 coloradosun.com
"It's like they don't believe in
COVID-19": Complaint claims ICE failing to contain infections at
Aurora facility Poor health standards resulted in a coronavirus outbreak
inside the immigration detention facility run by the private, for-profit
GEO Group, advocacy group says.
A national immigrant advocacy group has filed a
complaint with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security over a COVID
outbreak at the immigration detention facility in Aurora. The complaint,
filed by the American Immigration Council, alleges that Immigrations and
Customs Enforcement's official tally of active COVID cases within the
facility - which hit 138 on Feb. 7 - is an undercount because the facility
is not conducting adequate testing. There were 68 active cases within the
facility on Feb. 15, the most recent official account reported by the Vera
Institute of Justice. The facility has an average daily population of about
550. According to the complaint, the facility has not provided sufficient
opportunities for vaccination, is not enforcing mask rules for staff, is
not providing enough cleaning supplies and is neglecting the medical needs
of those who are detained. Detainees who want to speak out against the
issues fear reprisal, the complaint states. The complaint asks for improved
conditions within the facility and for more detainees to be released from
custody while their immigration cases are pending. "People should be
able to pursue their claims to immigration relief without putting their
physical and mental health at risk," the complaint states. The Aurora
facility, which is owned by the private, for-profit prison company GEO
Group, has been at the center of controversy before for its handling of the
pandemic during previous waves of infection. The complaint, which was filed
in partnership with the locally based Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy
Network, alleges that little has changed. RMIAN provides free attorneys and
legal services to adults and children in immigration detention in Colorado,
including those at the Aurora facility. "Access to medical care is a
human right," Colleen Cowgill, a RMIAN pro bono coordinating attorney,
said in a statement. "ICE cannot continue to detain people while
failing to provide for their health and safety. We are two years into the
pandemic and ICE has shown that it cannot protect those in its care."
In a statement to The Colorado Sun, ICE said the agency follows U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance in its facilities and
has vaccinated nearly 50,000 of its detainees nationwide. The agency says
it has translated vaccine informational materials into multiple languages
for its detainees and provides appropriate medical care for detainees who
do fall sick. As of late January, the agency had given monoclonal antibody
or antiviral treatments to 89 detainees nationwide with COVID. "ICE is
focused on delivering high-quality, evidence-based medical care and will
continue to ensure detained individuals receive care with dignity and
respect," the statement read. Affidavits filed by detainees included
in the complaint state that medical isolation cells at the Aurora facility
for detainees who contract COVID are dirty and testing is minimal. One
detainee, identified in the complaint by the pseudonym Leticia, said she
was left in the general population for several days even after her roommate
tested positive for COVID and she felt sick herself. "Although people
are often sick, I only see people getting tested for COVID-19 when they are
getting ready to fly to be deported," she said in her affidavit. When
she finally received a test - which came back positive - Leticia said she
was moved to a "suicide watch room," where she was initially
denied a television and also was not provided with craft supplies she had
requested to pass the time. "There was a really bad smell in the
suicide room because of an issue with the sewer pipes in the room,"
Leticia said in her affidavit. "Medical staff told me they had put in
service orders, but nothing had been done." Detainees also allege that
guards seldom provide masks to detainees or wear them properly themselves,
despite rules requiring them to do both. "If I asked an officer to get
me a mask, they would not because they do not have them or they don't want
to," one detainee, identified in the complaint by the pseudonym Musa,
stated in an affidavit. "It's like they do not care. It's like they
don't believe in COVID-19." Staffers for U.S. Rep. Jason Crow, an
Aurora Democrat whose district includes the Aurora facility, have been
conducting weekly monitoring of the facility since early in the pandemic.
His office's most recent report, dated Feb. 9, found that 140 of the 497
people housed at the facility on that date - 28% - were being
"cohorted" due to sickness. The term refers to the practice of
isolating groups of people in order to contain the spread of the virus. The
report also stated that 910 people housed at the facility have tested
positive for COVID since March 30, 2020 - a number that includes both ICE
detainees and people held there by the U.S. Marshals Service. There have
been 218 positive cases among ICE and GEO Group employees working at the
facility. The complaint echoes concerns he has long raised about the Aurora
detention facility, Crow said in a statement. "The allegations
outlined in this report are serious and highlight the ongoing need for
oversight of these private, for-profit facilities," Crow said. "I
remain committed to holding this facility accountable and increasing
transparency."
Mar 3, 2021
denver.cbslocal.com
Aurora City Council Approves Letter
To White House Supporting Push To End Private Prisons
AURORA, Colo.
(CBS4) – President Joe Biden is clear about his desire to end the use of
private prisons in the United States, and the Aurora City Council is
backing that move. A letter to the president was approved Monday night. In
their regular meeting on Monday, city councilors were largely split on the
letter. The final vote approving the letter was 6-4, with council members
Lawson, Hiltz, Johnston, Murillo, Coombs, and Marcano voting in favor. Mayor
Mike Coffman stood opposed, but because the vote did not result in a tie,
he did not need to vote to break the tie. He will sign his name to the
letter. However, Councilmember Dave Gruber said he did not support the
letter and asked for notification of when the letter was sent so he could
send a counter letter. The letter also asked the president to extend the
cancellation of private prison contracts to those who detain immigrants.
Aurora is home to the GEO detention facility, a location run by Immigration
and Customs Enforcement where agents house those apprehended for
immigration violations. “As you know during the last administration
immigrants and immigrant’s rights had been under intense attack. They have
been subjected to well-documented inhumane conditions within the GEO Group,
a private company that has a detention facility in Aurora,” the letter
reads in part. “Considering all this, the City Council of the City of
Aurora respectfully requests that your administration also cancel the
outstanding contracts with private detention facilities engaged in the
business of detaining immigrants.” In his first week in office, President
Biden ordered the U.S. Justice Department to end reliance on private
prisons and noted the federal government needed to change its entire
approach on racial equity. “We must change now,” President Biden said. “I
know it’s going to take time, but I know we can do it. And I firmly believe
the nation is ready to change. But government has to change as well.”
Arizona Department of Corrections
Mar 29, 2014
azcentral.com
The Republican-crafted state budget now includes $900,000 in additional
funding to pay for private prison beds operated by GEO Group Inc., even
though the state Department of Corrections doesn't think the increase is
needed. Private-prison lobbyists succeeded in getting state lawmakers to
include nearly $1 million in extra funding in the state budget even though
the Arizona Department of Corrections says the money isn't needed. The
eleventh-hour funding was placed into the budget by House Appropriations
Chairman John Kavanagh, R-Fountain Hills, who said GEO Group Inc. lobbyists
informed him the company wasn't making enough money from the emergency beds
it provides Arizona at prisons in Phoenix and Florence. The request came
even though GEO bid for its contracts and had agreed to previously
negotiated rates with the Corrections Department, which guarantees the
company nearly 100 percent occupancy at its prisons. House Minority Leader
Chad Campbell of Phoenix was incensed by the additional money for GEO.
Related: Arizona sheriffs assail costs of private prisons Previously:
Arizona faces growing cost of private prisons He voiced disappointment on
the House floor late Thursday during the budget debate and again Friday, telling
The Arizona Republic that the request "came out of nowhere." Some
lawmakers, he said, learned of the addition to the House budget hours
before members began voting on it. Campbell said Kavanagh is responsible
for pushing the proposal through the House with support from all but one
Republican: Rep. Ethan Orr of Tucson. "This is somebody getting a
handout," Campbell said. "It's unnecessary. This came out of
nowhere — I mean that. No one said a word about it. It wasn't in the Senate
budget, it didn't come as a request from DOC. There's something really
shady here." Doug Nick, a state Corrections spokesman, confirmed his
agency did not seek additional money for GEO. "We did not request
it," Nick said. "We had nothing to do with it." The state
this fiscal year is projected to pay GEO $45 million to house minimum- and
medium-security inmates in the company's 2,530 beds, according to
Corrections records. Guaranteed rate: Arizona guarantees GEO an occupancy
rate of 95 to 100 percent at those facilities. GEO, based in Boca Raton,
Fla., posted $115 million in profits on $1.52 billion in revenue in 2013.
The company, which is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange, is
worth $2.3 billion, and it paid Chairman and Chief Executive George Zoley
$4.62 million in total compensation last year. The additional money for GEO
comes as lawmakers debate a $9.2 billion budget passed by the House late
Thursday night. The $900,000 for GEO was one of many additions made to get
the support of some holdout Republicans. Democratic lawmakers criticized
the spending proposal, saying private prisons are being prioritized over
education. Caroline Isaacs, a watchdog on prison spending and the program
director for the American Friends Service Committee, called the additional
funding "outrageous." "Why this corporation feels it's
entitled to bypass the contract process with a state agency it is serving
and go directly to the money man (Kavanagh) is incredible," Isaacs
said. "This indicates a level of coziness that should make taxpayers nervous."
Isaacs said lawmakers appear more concerned about padding GEO's bottom line
instead of looking out for public education and abused children who have
fallen through the cracks at Child Protective Services. Kavanagh said GEO
had been giving the state a "cut rate" for emergency beds during
the recession and, "now that the economy has come back, they want to
get more money." He said if GEO didn't take the inmates, it would cost
the state more to house them at overcrowded facilities. GEO, however, is not
at full capacity, records show. The company as of Friday was housing 2,466
inmates in its 2,530 beds. Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio and sheriff's
offices in Apache, Pinal, Cochise, Navajo and Santa Cruz counties have said
they would be willing to take Department of Corrections inmates to ease the
state's overcrowding burden and make some additional money. Beds available:
The six sheriffs have said they could provide at least 1,750 beds. Kavanagh
declined to identify the lobbyists who asked him for additional money for
GEO. State lobbying records show that Pivotal Policy Consulting represents
GEO. Neither Pivotal Policy Consulting nor GEO Group could be reached
Friday. The state Senate will hold a hearing on the budget Monday. Senate
Appropriations Chairman Don Shooter, R-Yuma, declined to speculate on
whether the additional funding for GEO will remain. "We can't talk
anything about the budget process,'' Shooter said. "It would be bad
form."
Jan 2, 2014 azcentral.com
Facts, not philosophy, should be the foundation
of state policy. Tell the Legislature. Tell Gov. Jan Brewer. After years of
studies showed that private prisons cost more than state prisons,
conservative supporters of privatization repealed a statutory requirement
to compare costs. Convenient for those who like private prisons. Not
helpful to those who want policy based on solid information. Arizona is
putting increasing numbers of inmates into private prisons — even
guaranteeing high occupancy rates at those private facilities. This represents
the triumph of an ideological bent toward privatization. We don’t know
whether it represents the taxpayers’ best interests. Arizona agreed to
contracts that guarantee 90 to 100 percent occupancy to the three
private-prison companies operating in the state, according to reporting by
The Arizona Republic’s Craig Harris. These are Corrections Corporation of
America, GEO Group Inc. and Management & Training Corp. There is more
to prison than costs and profit — or taxpayers’ deep pockets. Society locks
up criminals to protect others, to punish wrongdoing and, if possible, to
rehabilitate lawbreakers. Because most prisoners will return to our
streets, the public is best served when those convicted of crimes emerge
from the criminal-justice system able to abide by the law and function in
society. A focus on filling prison beds discourages alternatives to prison
that might be more cost-effective and more likely to reduce recidivism by
achieving real rehabilitation. A bill passed in 2012 eliminated the
statutory requirement for the Department of Corrections to do a cost
comparison between public and private prisons. It was signed into law by
Gov. Jan Brewer, who has long been a supporter of private prisons. It also
eliminated the previous statutory requirement for regular comparisons of
the services provided by private and public prisons, including a hard look
at such things as security, prisoner health and the safety of facilities.
This is particularly odd when you consider how questionable security
practices at a private Kingman prison became painfully obvious after the
2010 escape of three prisoners, two of whom killed an Oklahoma couple while
on the lam. Statutes still require cost savings and equitable performance.
But the comparisons are not the same. Surveys by Department of Corrections
in 2008, 2009 and 2010 found that it was more expensive to incarcerate
inmates in privately run medium-security prisons than it was in similar
state facilities. These studies factored in the differences in inmate
costs, including that private prisons house only healthy inmates, while
state prisons incarcerate those with expensive medical or mental-health
problems. A comparison in fiscal 2013 that did not adjust for these
differences found a lower cost at private prisons. How convenient. It might
make sense to reduce the state’s capital expenses by contracting with
private prisons rather than building new facilities. But we need to
consider all the facts when making that determination. What’s more,
guaranteeing occupancy to private operators creates a profit motive for
locking people up that should be unsettling to all who treasure civil
liberties. Arizona needs to take a harder look at whether private prisons
make sense.
March 25, 2013
azcapitoltimes.com
A trial is set for next month in a sexual
harassment lawsuit pitting the state against one of its private prison
contractors in a battle that promises to shine a harsh light on private
prisons and the Arizona Department of Corrections. The Attorney General’s
Civil Rights Division alleges that male workers with GEO Group, which
operates three prisons for the state, sexually harassed female co-workers
for several years while supervisors and managers for the company looked the
other way. Although the state is the plaintiff in the case, the lawsuit has
uncovered information that a civil rights attorney, a lawmaker and critics
of the Department of Corrections say is damning to the Department of
Corrections. The allegations in the lawsuit took place before Charles Ryan
became director of DOC, but the critics say problems have continued under
his leadership. “It’s not just private prisons,” said House Minority Leader
Chad Campbell, D-Phoenix, a steadfast opponent of private prisons. “There’s
blatant mismanagement in our public prisons, too.” Campbell said he is
working with community groups to call for Ryan’s firing as high-profile
problems mount. In recent weeks, Ryan disclosed that employees are arrested
at a rate of 11 per month, mostly for drunken driving and domestic
violence. A federal judge gave class status to 33,000 prisoners and all
future prisoners in a lawsuit alleging substandard health care. And a local
television station aired video of inmate Tony Lester’s suicide in which
correctional officers stood around the bleeding man without providing
emergency care. After Ryan took over in 2009, the agency was rocked when a
July 30, 2010, escape from a Kingman private prison led to the deaths of an
Oklahoma couple. The company that won the $349 million contract to provide
health care for prisoners parted ways with the state after just 6 months.
Gov. Jan Brewer’s spokesman, Matt Benson, said she still stands behind
Ryan. “He performs a very difficult job under difficult circumstances,”
Benson said. Prisoner advocate Donna Hamm, of Middle Ground Prison Reform,
also defended Ryan, saying Arizona’s prison system has been dysfunctional
for the 30 years she has been an advocate and Ryan is more responsive to
problems than the other five directors over that time. “He does not ignore
or make excuses,” Hamm said. Bill Lamoreaux, a department spokesman, said
Ryan was out of town and unavailable for comment. Lamoreaux also said the
department has been advised by lawyers not to discuss pending litigation.
History of mistreatment: Court documents in the GEO suit paint a picture of
female correctional officers having to deal with raunchy statements
directed at them and fondling by their male co-workers. Attorney Stephen
Montoya, whose client, Alice Hancock, is a former GEO correctional officer
and an intervener in the case, said the sexual harassment at GEO is an
extension of the DOC culture. In February 2012, DOC agreed to pay a former
female officer $182,000 to settle a sexual harassment complaint brought by
the U.S. Department of Justice. Montoya has won jury awards of $200,000 and
$600,000 for women who used to work for DOC, and he said many of the
correctional officers with GEO worked previously for the department. The
$600,000 award was reduced to $300,000 due to limitations on compensatory
damages. In one of the cases, U.S. District Court Judge Frederick Martone
said DOC was reckless in its management by “allowing bestial people to run
unsupervised throughout the process and employing ineffective and
incompetent supervisory staff that knew about things and failed to do
anything about it in a timely way.” Lamoreaux pointed out, however, that
the allegations in the GEO suit and the actions against DOC occurred before
Ryan took over as an appointee of Brewer in January 2009. Dora Schriro,
appointed by Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano, was in charge. Part of the
DOJ settlement required DOC to improve its sexual harassment policies, and
Ryan has said in written statements that the bad behavior wouldn’t be
tolerated under his watch. Hamm said the recent problems plaguing DOC have
existed under every administration she has seen in 30 years, but they are
just getting more exposure today. “Those problems are not unique to Charles
Ryan’s administration,” Hamm said. However, Montoya said Ryan tolerates
women being “treated like trash,” and he points to the promotion of Carson
McWilliams as proof. McWilliams was the warden of the prison where
Montoya’s client, Michelle Barfield, was sexually harassed. Ryan promoted
McWilliams in April 2011 to be the department’s Northern Regional
operations director a little more than a year after the $600,000 verdict.
“In the government workplace, if there is pervasive illegality, it’s
because it is tolerated from the top to the bottom,” Montoya said. A
pattern of problems: The lawsuit is a compilation of suits filed by the
Attorney General’s Civil Rights Division, the Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission and Montoya, and when the witnesses begin taking the stand on
April 9, their testimony is sure to become fodder for opponents of private
prisons. Probably the harshest critic of private prisons is the American
Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization that generally advocates
for the rights of prisoners. Caroline Isaacs, Friends’ executive director
in Arizona, said the lawsuit is one more damning piece of information that
confirms there is a consistent pattern of problems with private prisons.
Isaacs has spent thousands of hours documenting misconduct in private
prisons. “These problems are found in all for-profit prisons, and you
simply can’t dismiss them as ‘bad apples,’” Isaacs said. The lawsuit
alleges that male workers regularly grabbed their female co-workers’
genitals and breasts and made obscene gestures toward them. The suit says
that in some instances, males exposed themselves to the women. Montoya said
the prisoners showed more respect to the women than the male officers did.
GEO is trying to keep out of the trial evidence that one of the most
prolific alleged perpetrators was fired twice by other private prisons, once
while he was being investigated for sexual harassment before GEO hired him
in 2007. Sherri Haahr, a GEO human resources official, testified in
deposition that the company didn’t know about Robert Kroen’s background
because the contract with DOC doesn’t require employment reference checks.
Haahr testified that DOC does criminal background checks itself and
approves anyone who is hired by GEO. GEO lawyers argue that Kroen’s
employment history isn’t relevant because the decision to hire him was
DOC’s. Pablo Paez, a GEO spokesman, declined comment. “We cannot comment on
litigation related matters. We can however confirm that our company
vigorously disagrees with these allegations and intends to defend its
position,” Paez said. And while DOC has onsite monitors at its private
prisons, their job is to make sure the company maintains appropriate
staffing levels of “qualified personnel” required by contract, Lamoreaux
said. He said the contractors are responsible for their own human resource
systems. Campbell, the state representative who regularly introduces
legislation to regulate private prisons more, said he isn’t surprised there
are no routine reference checks in hiring. “At the end of the day, the buck
stops at DOC,” Campbell said.
May 2, 2004
Groups of Arizona prisoners transferred to a Texas private prison staged
fights and hunger strikes to either improve conditions or earn transfers
back to Arizona. The incident report from Wackenhut Corp.'s Pecos,
Texas, prison officials recommends eight inmates be sent back to Arizona
because they are security problems. The report details a fight
between two groups of prisoners, with at least 14 taking part in the
late-night April 10 fight. The subsequent investigation showed that some
inmates from each group were conspiring to get back to Arizona. The
decision last year by the Arizona Legislature to ship about 2,000 inmates
to out-of-state prisons angered some inmate family members, mainly because
contact with inmates will be limited by the financial ability to travel to
either Texas or another prison in Oklahoma. (Arizona Daily Star)
Arizona State Prison – Kingman
Jan 25, 2021
mohavedailynews.com
Prison staffers accused of sex with
inmates appear in court
KINGMAN — Two women who engaged in sexual
activity with inmates at the state prison in Golden Valley appeared for
separate hearings Wednesday in Mohave County Superior Court. Defense
attorney Mike Manusia asked that Melony Petrovffsky, 50, Golden Valley, be
spared from incarceration for her guilty plea to a charge of unlawful
sexual conduct by a correctional employee. "She’s completely
humiliated and remorseful,” Manusia told Judge Rick Lambert. "She is
sick with grief.” Prosecutor James Schoppmann urged the Court to send a
sentencing message that fortifies the integrity of the justice system that
he said Petrovffsky stained. "The system itself is humiliated if
there’s no consequence,” Schoppmann said, noting there would be greater
community alarm if it was a male employee having sex with a female inmate.
"If the genders were reversed the public would be outraged. That
shouldn’t matter.” Lambert noted that Petrovffsky was instructed to avoid
improper communication and contact with inmates when she was trained for
her job with the GEO Group, the private company that operates the prison
under contract with the state. "The surveillance video captured you in
various sexual acts with an inmate,” Lambert told Petrovffsky. "You
breached your duty as a correctional employee and the Court finds that
probation under these circumstances is inappropriate." Lambert imposed
a six-month prison sentence. Another former GEO employee who also engaged
in sex with one or more inmates while manning the prison commissary pleaded
guilty to unlawful sexual conduct by a correctional employee. Eleven other
counts for the same charge are dismissed in the plea agreement for
Genevieve Belden, 32, Kingman. Prosecutor Phillip Delgado said Belden
kissed, fondled and had sexual intercourse with another inmate on multiple
occasions. Belden is eligible for probation but could get up to 1½ years in
prison when sentenced Feb. 19.
Nov 21, 2020 mohavedailynews.com
Two accused of having sex with prison
inmates
KINGMAN — Two area women allegedly had sex with
male inmates on multiple occasions at the prison that the GEO Group
operates in Golden Valley under a contract with the state of Arizona.
Genevieve Belden, 32, of Kingman, and Melony Petrovffsky, 50, of Golden
Valley, both entered not guilty pleas during their arraignment hearings
earlier this month at the Mohave County Courthouse in Kingman. Belden is
charged with a dozen counts of unlawful sexual conduct by a correctional
employee while Petrovffsky is charged with three counts of the same offense.
Reports by Arizona Department of Corrections criminal investigator Monique
Bullock indicated that alleged misconduct between Belden and an inmate
identified as C.W. was videotaped and reported on Nov. 15, 2019.
Petrovffsky reportedly supervised the prison commissary, where Belden also
worked. Petrovffsky became a suspect herself after reporting, along with
Lt. Steve Romero, that Belden and C.W. had engaged in sexual intercourse
behind shelving racks inside the prison store. “This criminal act was
caught on video surveillance,” Bullock’s report said. “Belden is facing the
wall while C.W. is behind her and he is seen thrusting back and forth.”
C.W., a child abuse convict, denied the allegations when initially
interviewed. He later admitted he and Belden had been involved for a couple
of months and that they would situate the shelving racks to create a
private space for intimacy inside the prison store where five male inmates
enjoyed work privileges. “He said he was not a victim and said he was
perfectly fine,” Bullock’s report said of C.W.’s admissions. “He said he
did not engage in anything he did not want to do and said he was not forced
against his will to engage in the sexual activity with Belden.” Bullocks’
report noted that another investigator, while reviewing surveillance video
in the Belden case, spotted flirtatious behavior involving Petrovffsky and
another inmate identified as I.P., a convicted child molester. Bullock said
the video revealed hugging, kissing and groping. Bullock said her review of
the video also showed I.P. and Petrovffsky engaged in sex acts on at least
two occasions. Prison Warden Jeff Wrigley confirmed that neither Belden nor
Petrovffsky are still employed by the GEO Group. He declined further
comment. State officials replied to an inquiry by issuing a statement
through media relations. “The Arizona Department of Corrections,
Rehabilitation and Reentry (ADCRR) does not tolerate any inappropriate
behavior by its staff or contracted staff and supports prosecution to the
fullest extent of the law," it said. Superior Court Judge Rick Lambert
advised both defendants they face potential prison terms, possibly lengthy,
if convicted as charged. Belden and Petrovffsky were released on their own
recognizance and directed to appear for separate pretrial conference
hearings scheduled Nov. 23.
Aurora INS Detention Facility
Aurora, Colorado
GEO Group (formerly known as Wackenhut Corrections)
Dec 1, 2019
westword.com
westword.com Scabies Outbreak at
Immigrant Detention Facility in Aurora
Twenty-five detainees at the immigrant detention
facility in Aurora have been quarantined since December 4 following an
outbreak of scabies. Of the 25, six have scabies, while another 19 have
been exposed, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesperson
Alethea Smock. "Each ICE detainee receives a medical examination upon
arrival at the facility to check for potential signs of illness. However,
ICE has no way of knowing what diseases or viruses a person may have been
exposed to before they enter the facility," Smock wrote to Westword in
a statement. The facility is run by private prison company GEO Group
through a contract with ICE. Scabies occurs when a human itch mite burrows
into the upper layer of the skin, where it lives and lays its eggs. When a
person is infected with scabies for the first time, they can be contagious,
even while not displaying symptoms for weeks. "The most common
symptoms of scabies are intense itching and a pimple-like skin rash. The
scabies mite usually is spread by direct, prolonged, skin-to-skin contact
with a person who has scabies,” according to the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC). “Prisons are often sites of scabies outbreaks,"
the CDC continued. The detainees will remain under quarantine until they
are treated with a topical ointment, which is arriving today, December 10.
"Once the treatment is administered, detainees will be removed from
cohort," Smock wrote. Westword has asked ICE why it's taken nearly a
week for the ointment to arrive; we'll add the agency's response if we
receive one. The facility has seen intermittent outbreaks of mumps and
chicken pox throughout 2019, leading to multiple quarantines. In March,
more than 350 detainees were quarantined because of possible exposure to
mumps or chicken pox, or both. Following the spate of outbreaks in the
early months of the year, the GEO detention facility began working with the
Tri-County Health Department. All detainees and staff members were offered
the measles, mumps and rubella vaccination, and the facility now reports
infectious disease outbreaks to Tri-County Health. However staff at the
detention facility were not required to notify the department of the
scabies outbreak. “Scabies is not something that is reportable to the
health department, so we are not involved,” Gary Sky, a spokesperson for
the Tri-County Health Department, wrote to Westword in an email. In July,
Congressman Jason Crow announced that his staff would begin weekly
inspections of the facility, which have continued to this day.
Jun 22, 2019
westword.com
Three Escaped Colorado ICE Detainees
Have Been Captured
The three ICE detainees who escaped from the GEO
detention facility in Aurora on June 16 were recaptured on Thursday, June
20. ICE officers found them in three separate locations. Amilcar
Aguilar-Hernandez, 23, Douglas Amaya-Arriaga, 18, and Carlos
Perez-Rodriguez, 18, climbed a fifteen-foot fence at the facility during
their escape just around noon on June 16. The immigration detention
facility is run by private prison company GEO Group through a contract with
Immigration and Customs Enforcement. ICE said in a press release that after
escaping, the three men spent three days at a "safe house" in
Colorado Springs. "Their goal was to earn enough money to leave
Colorado. However, they were forced to split up once they were
recognized," the press release said. ICE officers captured
Aguilar-Hernandez in Colorado Springs. Amaya-Arriaga was found in a suburban
Denver house with another undocumented immigrant, who was arrested during
Amaya-Arriaga's capture. ICE officers found and arrested Perez-Rodriguez
after he left an apartment in a large complex in Denver. “The investigative
techniques and sheer determination of our team shows that if you run, you
won’t be able to hide. We will find you and bring you to justice,"
said John Fabbricatore, the acting Denver ICE field office director, in the
press release. The three detainees will now be prosecuted in federal court
in Denver for their escape. Aguilar-Hernandez, originally from El Salvador,
has a criminal conviction for felony trespassing and is a suspect in a rape
case in Fort Carson. The two others, both from Honduras, had no prior
criminal history. ICE is still looking into the circumstances that led to
their escape. Despite the search for these three detainees coming to a
close, ICE officers in Denver are likely to remain busy in the coming
weeks. Multiple news outlets are reporting that an ICE operation targeting
up to 2,000 undocumented immigrant families in ten cities, including
Denver, will begin as early as Sunday, June 23. Officers will be focusing
on individuals that have final orders of deportation.
Jun 19, 2019 federalnewsnetwork.com
3 men escape from immigrant detention
center in Colorado
AURORA,
Colo. (AP) — Authorities are searching for three men who escaped from an
immigrant detention center in Colorado. The Sentinel reports the U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency says the men escaped from the
center in Aurora around noon Sunday. Authorities are searching for
23-year-old Amiclar Aguilar-Hernandez of El Salvador, 18-year-old Douglas
Amaya-Arriaga and 18-year-old Carlos Perez-Rodriguez, both of Honduras. ICE
officials say the men scaled a 15-foot (5 meter), chain-link fence and then
went over a recreation area wall in the city 9 miles (14 kilometers) east
of Denver. ICE says Aguilar-Hernandez has a conviction for felony
trespassing and is a suspect in a rape case at Fort Carson Army Base near
Colorado Springs. GEO Group Inc., the private company that operates the
center, would not comment and referred questions to ICE.
Jun 7, 2019
westword.com
Report: Aurora Immigrant Detention Facility Violates Multiple ICE
Standards
According to a new
federal government report, the immigration detention facility in Aurora
violates multiple government detention standards. "This report by the
Department of Homeland Security Inspector General confirms what we have
been hearing for quite some time: that detainees at ICE's Aurora facility
are not being properly cared for," Congresswoman Diana DeGette said in
a statement. Congressman Jason Crow, whose district includes Aurora,
referred to the report as "deeply disturbing" in a written
statement. On June 3, the Office of Inspector General at the Department of
Homeland Security published its analysis of four detention centers that
house detainees in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody, including
the facility in Aurora (the other three are located in Louisiana,
California and New Jersey). The report found that the Aurora facility,
which is run by private prison company GEO Group through a contract with
ICE, violates ICE standards for outdoor recreation, in-person visitations
and restraining detainees in solitary confinement. The authors of the
report investigated the facilities "in response to concerns raised by
immigrant rights groups and complaints to the Office of Inspector General
(OIG) Hotline about conditions for detainees held in U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody." Before the investigators visited
the Aurora facility, staff used handcuffs on detainees in solitary
confinement when they were outside their cells. However, according to the
report, that protocol didn't comply with ICE standards, since
"placement in disciplinary segregation alone does not constitute a
valid basis for using restraints." According to ICE, security staff at
the Aurora facility have since received "refresher training"
about when to use handcuffs for detainees in solitary confinement, and a
security officer will now ensure that staffers comply with the protocol by
reviewing security footage daily. The report notes that the Aurora facility
does not provide a true outdoor recreation space for detainees, which "may
reduce detainee mental health and welfare." Detainees have daily
access to a recreation center inside the facility that has an open-air,
albeit caged, roof. Investigators interviewed detainees at the Aurora
facility who said they wanted "true outdoor recreation for the fresh
air, sunshine and exercise, and for playing soccer with their fellow
detainees." ICE argues that the recreation space in the Aurora
facility fully complies with — and actually far exceeds — government
standards. At the time of the inspection, the Aurora facility did not allow
in-person visits for detainees, which the federal government recommends
would help with morale. Noting that in-person visits are only recommended
and not required (except for lawyers), ICE says that staff at the facility
will now review requests for in-person visits on a case-by-case basis. The
report comes nearly a year after ICE finished its own investigation into a
December 2017 death at the Aurora facility that found staffers largely
mishandled the care of Kamyar Samimi, who died after being in custody for
about two weeks. And as of June 4, 152 detainees at the Aurora facility
were under quarantine because of cases of mumps and chicken pox. "The
report points to the fact that this is an extremely oppressive, punitive
environment, where it may take a real toll on an individual detainee’s
mental health," says Liz Jordan, an attorney who advocates on behalf
of detainees through the Civil Rights Education and Enforcement Center.
Feb 1, 2019
westword.com
There's Been Another Chicken Pox
Outbreak at Immigrant Detention Facility
There has been another
chicken pox outbreak at the immigrant detention center in Aurora, the
second in just three months. A detainee "pod," which is a prison
housing unit consisting of individual cells, was quarantined for weeks
after an outbreak in October. Now two pods have been quarantined for 21
days because of the virus, said GEO Group spokesman Pablo Paez in an email.
Paez did not answer additional questions about why a second outbreak had occurred,
or what the facility, which is managed by private-prison company GEO Group
through a contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was doing to
prevent future outbreaks. But today, January 31, I met a detainee at the
facility who described what it was like being under quarantine during last
fall's outbreak. From behind a glass partition in the center's visitor
room, Miguel Angel, 34, described how guards one day told his pod, which
housed 77 detainees, that they couldn't leave their housing unit, offering
no explanation. “We had no idea what was going on,” Angel recalls.
"Guards just told us that we had to wait.” They wound up waiting for a
few days, during which they couldn't access the recreation yard, see
visitors, consult face-to-face with lawyers, or even attend their
immigration hearings. About a week in, the detainees finally learned that
they were under a medical quarantine because of a possible chicken pox
outbreak, Angel says. The potentially sick individuals had been removed
from the housing unit before it was locked down. And weeks into the
quarantine, a doctor still had not visited the pod. Exasperated, Angel and
about sixty other detainees wrote letters to ICE and the GEO Group
demanding answers — and to see a doctor. Here's the letter: It has been two
weeks now that we have been in quarantine and not one doctor has been sent
to this pod to offer medical treatment for the chicken pox. The first three
people that were infected have been treated, cured and were switched over
to a different pod, and are now living their normal process. But we have no
visits, deportations, and our court [hearings] are being delayed. They
won't exchange our blankets, give haircuts, and we are prohibited from
having rec time in the yard. We are being exposed to dangerous medical
conditions living like this, causing depression, anxiety, high blood
pressure, and conditions that could be fatal. The most difficult part is
the court dates being rescheduled. Many of us have already had chicken pox
or been vaccinated. Our immigration process is being delayed because this
outbreak wasn't properly handled from the start, and it's not fair. It
feels like medical resources don't want to be used on us because we don't
deserve it. We are all in desperate need of help. Meanwhile, he saw
firsthand how the lock-down put some detainees at greater medical risk
since they didn't have regular access to a medical staff. One young man,
who was complaining of a fever and had lost his appetite, asked guards to
take him to a doctor. The guards stuck the man in his cell, believing that
he had chicken pox, according to Angel. But then he collapsed, and guards
had to rush in and do CPR to resuscitate him. "His heart had stopped
briefly," Angel claims. After CPR, the man was transferred out of the
pod, Angel remembers. Either that episode or the letters finally got GEO
Group's attention. A doctor finally visited the pod, dressed in a full-body
hazmat suit “looking like an astronaut,” says Angel. Some of the
information that Angel provided about October's outbreak (at least the
number of individuals who were quarantined) runs counter to what ICE had
told media outlets, including Westword, at the time. “Of the 77 detainees
who were tested, medical staff diagnosed three detainees with varicella;
seven others had low immunity and therefore possessed increased risk
factors of contracting the disease; all ten were quarantined at the
facility,” spokesman Carl Rusnok said in a statement. “The Aurora medical
staff continues to provide high-level care to all those affected, while at
the same time continuing to serve the medical needs of the entire facility
population.” Multiple requests for comment sent to ICE about the second
outbreak haven't been returned; if and when they are, we'll update this story.
Angel says he feels for fellow detainees who are locked up in the two
affected pods. Asked why he believes this has happened a second time, he
says, “it's because our lives don't matter to them. We could die in here
and there's nothing we can do."
Dec 21, 2017 westword.com
ACLU Investigating Death of Iranian Immigrant at Aurora Detention
Facility
Earlier this morning, the ACLU of Colorado announced that it filed a
Freedom of Information Act request to obtain more information about how a
64-year-old Iranian man, Kamyar Samimi, died while being held at the
Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Aurora on December
2. ICE issued a statement two days after Samimi died, saying that the
primary cause of death was cardiac arrest and that Samimi had been
transferred to the University of Colorado Medical Center on the morning of
December 2 before he was pronounced dead shortly after 12 p.m. The ACLU of
Colorado wants to know exactly what happened. “Once again, a death in ICE
custody raises serious questions about whether the agency is continuing to
fail in its legal duty to provide necessary and adequate medical care to
detainees in its custody,” says Mark Silverstein, legal director for the
ACLU of Colorado. In 2012, a 46-year-old named Evalin-Ali Mandza died of
cardiac arrest at the same detention center. An investigation of that death
showed that staff at the GEO Group-run facility did not know how to
properly use an EKG machine and stalled in calling an ambulance. The GEO
Group manages private prisons across the U.S. and contracts with ICE to
manage immigrant-detention facilities. The ACLU has looked into deaths at
immigrant-detention facilities nationwide and co-authored a report in 2016
called "Fatal Neglect: How ICE Ignored Deaths in Detention."
Nearly 200 immigrant detainees have died while in custody in ICE facilities
since 2003. Samimi, who came to the United States as a student in 1976 and
was arrested at his home on November 17 by ICE (the agency says he had a
minor drug conviction from 2005), is the latest detainee to die in
Colorado. “Mr. Samimi’s arrest, detention and death in custody display the
inhumanity of our current federal immigration policies,” says ACLU of
Colorado staff attorney Arash Jahanian. “He lived in the U.S. for forty years.
ICE arrested him at his home with the intent to ship him off to a country
he no longer knew. Then they locked him up in a detention facility, where
he died two weeks later. ICE gave very little detail about what happened
but made sure to mention his twelve-year-old drug-possession charge. The
community deserves better, and that starts with ICE explaining what led to
Mr. Samimi’s tragic death.” Silverstein characterizes ICE's detention
facilities as "cloaked in secrecy." "[They] offer little to
no transparency into the way detainees are treated within their walls,” the
legal director says. "We are invoking the Freedom of Information Act
to further the public’s right to know what goes on in these secretive
taxpayer-funded institutions.” Meanwhile, a class action lawsuit is being
tried in federal court over alleged forced labor practices at the Aurora
facility. In September, the ACLU of Colorado found that clients of Iraqi
descent being held at the facility were being harassed by guards and
pressured to self-deport. A GEO Group spokesman told Westword at the time:
"The Aurora, Colorado, facility has a longstanding record of providing
highly rated services in a safe, secure and humane residential environment
while treating all those entrusted to our care with the respect and dignity
they deserve."
Sep 6, 2017 miaminewtimes.com
ACLU Says South Florida Private Prison Giant Is Torturing Immigration
Detainees
Boca Raton's GEO Group is one of the most powerful private-prison
companies in America — and a major player in state and federal politics.
GEO throws campaign money at Florida lawmakers from both parties: Sens.
Marco Rubio and Bill Nelson, Gov. Rick Scott, Reps. Carlos Curbelo and
Mario Diaz-Balart, and the majority of the Florida Legislature have taken
thousands from GEO despite constant complaints from progressives and
human-rights activists who say the company profits from destroying the
lives of others. Well, here's yet another reason Florida politicians should
drop GEO Group like the plague: The American Civil Liberties Union said
Friday that the company is torturing whistleblowers at its private
immigration detention facility in Aurora, Colorado. GEO runs the facility
on behalf of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. According to the
ACLU, ICE agents at GEO's 1,500-bed Colorado detention center are
retaliating against Iraqi nationals who have joined an ACLU class-action
lawsuit to stop the U.S. from deporting them. The ACLU says employees at
the GEO facility are denying Iraqis food, water, and access to the restroom
to intentionally make their lives a living hell. "GEO, the second
largest immigration detention facility in the country, is a tightly
regulated, colorless institution with bare cement walls, large metal doors
that lock at every threshold, and scores of prisoners in scrubs," the
ACLU writes. "Each of the detainees we interviewed provided accounts
of mistreatment. These accounts were consistent, as was their palpable fear
of death if ultimately deported to Iraq." The ACLU writes today that
the Trump administration agreed to take Iraq off its list of countries
covered under the so-called Muslim ban if Iraq agreed to accept ICE
deportees. The ACLU has since sued, but the organization now says ICE
agents at the GEO facility are trying to make detainees miserable so they
choose to get deported. The ACLU writes: Since the court’s ruling, ICE
appears to have ramped up its efforts to make the lives of Iraqis in
custody so unbearable that they will “voluntarily” sign away their rights
to reopen their immigration cases or pursue asylum. The Iraqis have been
singled out and denied food, water, and access to the restroom. One man,
who came to the United States as a refugee in 1976, reflected that if he
goes back to Iraq, he will be tortured and killed. Still, he feels that his
experiences at the hands of ICE are “a different way of torture.” He has
told his wife that he is considering just signing the form and going back
to Iraq. In Arizona and Colorado, and on the plane traveling between the
two locations, ICE guards referred to the Iraqis as “camel jockey,” “rag
head,” and “terrorist.” Guards at GEO referred to one of our clients as ‘Al
Qaeda’ and told him, “You Iraqis are the worst people in here. We can’t
stand you Iraqis.” When he tried to say that he has rights, he was told
that he doesn’t have any rights because he was “an alien.” ICE guards in
Arizona and Colorado have openly pressured Iraqi nationals to sign away
their right to fight their immigration cases. Some guards told the
detainees that their situations were hopeless and urged them to sign forms
agreeing to voluntary deportation, without counsel present. Some Iraqis
apparently succumbed to the pressure. The brave men we spoke to have
decided to stay and fight. Miami New Times' sister newspaper Phoenix New
Times has covered the plight of Iraqi nationals trapped in an Arizona
detention center run by CoreCivic (formerly known as the Corrections
Corporation of America), GEO Group's main competitor. In July, an Arizona
judge blocked the deportation of 1,400 Iraqi Chaldean Catholics on the
grounds they could be tortured for their religious beliefs and ties to the
United States. In 2013, the Huffington Post reported that the
CCA/CoreCivic's lobbying firms have donated more than $20,000 to South
Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. In 2011, Wasserman Schultz threw her
support behind a plan to build a private, CCA-run immigration facility in
South Florida. That decision sparked protests and has cast a shadow over
her recent bids for reelection. But of the two companies, it's Boca's GEO
Group that remains the major political power in Florida. According to the
National Institute on Money in State Politics (NIMSP), GEO has given $7.8
million to 885 candidates across the nation over the past 17 years. The group
rains money in Florida: It is honestly difficult to find a state politician
who has not taken at least a tiny amount of money from the company in that
time period. According to NIMSP records, the group has sent checks to the
majority of the state Legislature in Tallahassee, Rubio has taken $30,500
from GEO, Curbelo has received $11,000, and Nelson has accepted $5,000.
Other recipients include U.S. Reps. Ted Deutch, Frederica Wilson, Mario
Diaz-Balart, Charlie Crist, and Governor Scott. GEO is still donating
today: The group gave former state Rep. Jose Feliz "Pepi" Diaz
$3,000 in his current race for the state Senate seat vacated by
N-word-dropping ex-lawmaker Frank Artiles. Last year, the Miami Herald
reported that GEO absolutely vomited cash at state Senate President Joe
Negron and his wife Rebecca, who ran for the GOP nomination for Senate last
year before Rubio announced his plans to run for reelection. The Herald
reported that GEO gave the couple a combined $288,000 in a single election
cycle. "It is tragic that these individuals, who fear persecution in
Iraq because of their religion and connection to America, are now being
persecuted by agents of the United States government," the ACLU wrote
last week.
Aug
18, 2017 nationallawjournal
Advocacy Groups Side With Plaintiffs Alleging Unpaid Labor At For-Profit
Prison
Advocacy groups have weighed in on a lawsuit against the nation's
second-largest for-profit prison provider, arguing in recently filed
"friend-of-the-court briefs" that GEO Group Inc.'s alleged
practices of relying on cheap and unpaid labor by detained immigrants
underscores abuses to this vulnerable community. Attorneys who filed the
lawsuit in 2014 are currently fighting to uphold class certification in the
case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. The U.S.
District Court for the District of Colorado in Denver originally certified
the class, which could include as many as 60,000 detainees who cycled in
and out of the GEO Group-owned Aurora Processing Detention Center in since
2004. Over the last week, a slew of advocacy organizations, including The
Southern Poverty Law Center, Public Citizen and a group of national
immigrant rights groups, filed briefs that point to the broader
implications of the case — noting issues around human trafficking and the
for-profit prison industry. They also discussed the importance of class
actions for vulnerable immigrant groups. This potential class action
against GEO, a Republican campaign donor, comes at a time when the $3
billion for-profit prison industry is gaining support from the Trump
administration. Earlier this year, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions
rescinded guidance from the Obama administration that would have reduced
the construction of privately owned prisons. A separate complaint has also
been filed at the Federal Election Commission by the Campaign Legal Center
against GEO, claiming the company illegally contributed $225,000 to a
pro-Trump PAC during the 2016 election. And according to reports, the U.S.
Department of Justice under President Donald Trump has awarded the GEO
Group more federal contracts for private prison facilities. "This is
about the excesses of the private prison system and how it almost
invariably led to forced labor and human trafficking," said David
Lopez of Outten & Golden, who represents the plaintiffs in the Aurora
case. "This case illustrates why it's dangerous and they have a
built-in system to keep the costs down. Absent of such class actions, who
will hold them accountable?" Outten & Golden attorneys this year
joined Nashville-based immigration attorney Andrew Free, attorneys for
Denver-based advocacy group Towards Justice and Colorado-based attorneys
for Milstein Law Office and Meyers Law Office in bringing the suit. The
lawsuit claims that GEO amassed enormous profits through "forced
labor" provided to the Aurora prison through a contract with U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The suit takes aim at the company's
"sanitation policy" that required ICE detainees to work as janitors
without pay under the threat of solitary confinement. It also targets a
"voluntary work program" that allegedly paid detainees only $1 a
day. Two classes were certified by the Denver federal court that could
include between 40,000 to 60,000 laborers that were detained in Aurora over
the last 10 years. The private prison system, and its profit margin,
appears to depend upon this type of labor, Free said. He said the case in
Colorado is a reflection that such policies and practices affect a wide
array of people in the immigration system. "These policies run
directly counter to protections that people have fought hard to apply to
all immigrants and workers," Free said. "How exactly would these
staffing plans work if companies were not allowed to use free and nearly
free labor of detainees?" In a statement, GEO responded that the
volunteer work program at all of its 143 immigration facilities, as well as
the minimum wage rates and standards, are set by the government. The
company also said that all of its facilities, including the Aurora center,
are "highly rated and provide high-quality services in safe, secure
and humane residential environments pursuant to the federal government's
national standards." "GEO has consistently, strongly refuted the
allegations made in this lawsuit, and we intend to continue to vigorously
defend our company against these claims," the company said in the
statement. The organizations filing briefs supporting plaintiffs in the
suit against GEO, a massive for-profit prison company, include the Southern
Poverty Law Center and the National Employment Law Project.GEO: Facing
legal challenges.
Jul 10, 2015 abcnews.go.com
Lawsuit: Immigrants
Got $1 a Day for Work at Private Prison
Immigrants who were detained at a suburban Denver
facility while they awaited deportation proceedings are suing the private
company that held them, alleging they were paid $1 a day to do janitorial
work, sometimes under threat of solitary confinement. They scrubbed
toilets, mopped and swept floors, did laundry, and prepared and served
meals, among other duties, according to attorneys who filed the lawsuit in
October on behalf of nine current and former detainees. On Monday, U.S.
District Court Judge John L. Kane declined a request from the Florida-based
GEO Group Inc. to dismiss the claims against it, allowing the federal
lawsuit to proceed. GEO is one of the largest contractors with the federal
government for the detention of immigrants suspected of being in the
country illegally or legal permanent residents with criminal records who
face deportation. The company has denied wrongdoing and said in court
documents the work is voluntary and it is abiding by federal guidelines in
paying $1 a day. Attorneys for the immigrants say they'll move to expand
the case by seeking class-action status. They say the judge's ruling clears
the way to gather more information from GEO through discovery proceedings
about how many detainees were put to work. The attorneys said they've heard
from clients for years that immigrants labor for almost nothing at private
detention facilities around the country, but they called the lawsuit filed
in Colorado the first of its kind. "It's their job to run the
facility, and instead they used and abused us to run the facility, and
that's why we're suing," said plaintiff Alejandro Menocal, 53. Menocal
is a legal permanent resident who was detained for three months at GEO's
Aurora facility while facing deportation last fall. GEO responded in a
statement that its facilities "provide high-quality services in safe,
secure and humane residential environments, and our company strongly
refutes allegations to the contrary." The company added attorneys and
immigrant advocates have full access to its facilities that U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement contracts with, and they're routinely
audited and inspected by the government. Anita Sinha, a faculty member at
Washington College of Law, American University who has researched immigrant
labor at private detention centers, said the daily wage was set by Congress
in 1950 and hasn't been adjusted for inflation. She said on a daily basis,
immigrants facing deportation occupy about 34,000 beds nationally in
private and government-run facilities. More than 60 percent of the beds are
in privately held facilities, she said. The company succeeded in getting
the judge to dismiss a claim that it violated Colorado's minimum wage law
because detainees were paid $1 a day instead of $8.23 an hour. In tossing
that claim, Kane said the detainees do not qualify as employees under state
law. But he said the lawsuit could proceed on the allegations that GEO
unjustly profited from the detainees and violated the federal Trafficking
Victims Protection Act, which prohibits forced labor. "Legally, this
is a big step forward," said Hans Meyer, Menocal's attorney. It's
common for inmates at state or privately run prisons to work below minimum
wage, in some cases for the purpose of gaining job training. "The
difference here is that these are civil immigration detainees who are not
being held for any criminal violation," said Brandt Milstein, another
attorney in the lawsuit. Menocal, a Mexican immigrant from Baja California,
was released in September and kept his legal resident status after his
attorney won his case. He said he faced deportation proceedings last year
when authorities learned after a traffic stop that he had a criminal record
from 2010 for driving with a suspended license and having his wife's
prescription painkillers in his car. He pleaded guilty and served a year of
probation soon after, but he didn't come to the attention of immigration
authorities at the time. The lawsuit focuses only on the GEO's suburban
Denver facilities, but the American Civil Liberties Union said the claims
are similar to allegations they've heard around the country. "There is
a name for locking people up and forcing them to do work without paying
real wages. It's called slavery," said Carl Takei, staff attorney at
the national prison project of the ACLU. The monetary amount the lawsuit
seeks hasn't been determined.
Jul 9, 2015
westword.com
GEO LAWSUIT ALLEGING FORCED LABOR OF IMMIGRANT DETAINEES MOVES FORWARD
Update below: In a move that could have resounding
consequences for corrections practices and the for-profit prison industry
in particular, a Denver federal judge has refused to dismiss a lawsuit
filed by nine federal immigrant detainees, who allege that a private prison
contractor forced them to perform maintenance and cleaning jobs for little
or no pay. The suit, which is seeking class-action status, accuses the
company of violating federal laws prohibiting human trafficking and forced
labor and seeks millions of dollars in damages. Senior U.S. District Judge
John L. Kane threw out some of the plaintiffs' claims but allowed the case
against The GEO Group, which operates a detention facility in Aurora under
contract with U.S. Immigrant and Customs Enforcement (ICE), to move
forward. The decision was hailed as "a tremendous victory for civil
immigrant detainees nationwide" by Nina DiSalvo, the executive
director of Towards Justice, a Denver-based nonprofit that partnered with
several law firms to bring the action. "The judge's decision allows us
to address the systemic problems with GEO's treatment of immigrant workers
throughout the legal system." One of the largest private prison
companies in the world, GEO operates 66 correctional facilities in the
United States, including ICE detention centers in Washington, Florida, and
Colorado. The complaint alleges that Aurora detainees participate in a
"voluntary work program" that includes laundry, kitchen and
cleaning jobs, for which they are paid a dollar a day. Six detainees are
also selected at random each day to clean the living pods without pay;
refusal can result in being placed in solitary confinement. The lawsuit
argued that the arrangement violates Colorado's minimum wage law. Judge
Kane disagreed, since the state's labor laws specifically carve out an
exception for prisoners, who are not considered employees. But Kane found
merit in the claim that GEO's approach to the pod-cleaning assignments — do
it or get thrown in the hole — may be a violation of the federal
Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which prohibits involuntary servitude
and coercive methods to demand work "by means of force, threats of
force, physical restraint, or threats of physical restraint." The
judge also allowed a claim involving unjust enrichment to proceed. Most correctional
systems depend on cheap inmate labor to keep costs down. Kane's denial of
GEO's motion to dismiss doesn't signal an end to that practice. It does,
however, raise questions about the ability of a private contractor to
demand that inmates perform basic maintenance or cleaning tasks under
threat of further punishment. "Using forced detainee labor is an
integral tool in maintaining GEO's profitability under its contracts with
ICE," Nashville attorney Andrew Free, a co-counsel in the case, noted
in prepared statement. "The court's decision today represents an
important step forward in ending that morally bankrupt business
model." GEO has not responded to a request for comment on the ruling.
We'll update this post if a response is forthcoming. Update, 1:00 p.m.: The GEO Group
corporate headquarters has provided a statement in response to our request
for comment that reads, in part: "GEO’s facilities, including the
Aurora, Colo., facility, provide high quality services in safe, secure, and
humane residential environments, and our company strongly refutes
allegations to the contrary. The volunteer work program at immigration
facilities as well as the wage rates and standards associated with the
program are set by the federal government. Our facilities adhere to these
standards as well as strict contractual requirements and all standards set
by ICE, and the agency employs several full-time, on-site contract monitors
who have a physical presence at each of GEO’s facilities."
Oct 23, 2014 stateswithoutnations.blogspot.com
GEO Sued for
Minimum Wage and Forced Labor Law Violations, and Unjust Enrichment
Yesterday, Alejandro
Menoca, Marcos Brambila, Grisel Xahuentitla, Hugo Hernandez, Lourdes, Argueta,
Jesus Gaytan, Olga Alexaklina, Dagaberto Vizguerra, and Demetrio Valerga on
their own behalf and others similarly situated filed a complaint informing
a federal judge that their guards were breaking the law. The complaint, filed by an
intrepid team of lawyers who spent extensive time interviewing detainees at
the GEO facility in Aurora, Colorado, states: In the course of their
employment by GEO, Plaintiffs and others scrubbed bathrooms, showers,
toilets, and windows throughout GEO’s Aurora facility. They cleaned and
maintained GEO’s on-site medical facility, cleaned the medical facility’s
toilets, floors and windows, cleaned patient rooms and medical staff
offices, swept, mopped, stripped, and waxed the floors of the medical
facility, did medical facility laundry, swept, mopped, stripped, and waxed
floors throughout the facility, did detainee laundry, prepared and served
detainee meals, assisted in preparing catered meals for law enforcement
events sponsored by GEO, performed clerical work for GEO, prepared clothing
for newly arriving detainees, provided barber services to detainees, ran
the facility’s law library, cleaned the facility’s intake area and solitary
confinement unit, deep cleaned and prepared vacant portions of the facility
for newly arriving detainees, cleaned the facility’s warehouse, and
maintained the exterior and landscaping of the GEO building, inter alia.
The complaint also includes violations of a federal law prohibiting Forced
Labor, 18 U.S.C. § 1589: 5. GEO or its agents also randomly selected
six detainees per pod each day and forced them to clean the pods. In the
handbook that GEO distributed to the detainees, GEO announced a “Housing
Unit Sanitation” policy informing the people held at the facility that
“[e]ach and every detainee must participate in the facility’s sanitation
program.” 6. GEO or its agents forced Plaintiffs and other civil
immigration detainees to clean the facility’s pods for no pay and under
threat of solitary confinement as punishment for any refusal to work. And
the complaint references Colorado Common Law prohibiting Unjust
Enrichment. In precise and riveting language the 21 page brief
brilliantly lays out the legal problems with the private prison industry's
business model. The attorneys who filed this lawsuit are Brandt Milstein,
Boulder, CO; Andrew Turner, Denver, CO; Alexander Hood, Golden, CO; Hans
Meyer, Denver, CO; and Andrew Free, Nashville, TN. I have been filing FOIA
requests on this topic for several years and Andrew Free is currently
representing me in extricating additional material for use in a working
paper that will be revised for publication next year in the Georgetown
Immigration Law Journal. For more research on related violations,
please go here.
February 16, 2009 The
Aurora Sentinel
About 50 people from various advocacy groups gathered near an Aurora
detention facility Monday, Feb. 16, to rally for changes to the nation’s
immigration policies and an end to raids on suspected illegal immigrants.
The vigil, which was organized by local clergy, was one of more than 100
actions across the country aimed at “demonstrating the faith communities’
commitment to inject humanity and compassion into the public dialogue on
immigration,” organizers said in a statement. Jennifer Piper, of the Quaker
organization American Friends Service Committee, said ending raids was one
of the main goals of the vigil. “These raids really tear families and
workers out of our community,” Piper said. The vigil brought out a diverse
crowd with participants ranging from toddlers to senior citizens. The group
clutched candles, said prayers and spoke about their concerns. “All faith
traditions share a common mandate to welcome and care for all members of
our community and love our neighbors as ourselves,” Jeremy Shaver, executive
director of the Interfaith Alliance of Colorado, said in a statement. “As
people of faith, we must keep that in the forefront of our minds as we
approach the complex issue of immigration.” Organizers said recent
immigration raids have been destructive for immigrants’ families and they
hope the vigils lead to change in Washington. “We call on President Obama
and members of Congress to demonstrate the courage to pass immigration
policies that uphold and protect the dignity and human rights of all,” Shaver
said. The vigil was held just a few blocks from a privately owned and
operated detention facility that houses suspected illegal immigrants.
Florida-based GEO Group, which owns the facility, has plans to expand it —
a proposal that has come under fire from immigrant groups.
January 8, 2008 Colorado
Confidential
A former corrections employee is suing prison contractor The GEO Group,
operator of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention
facility in Aurora. In a suit filed in Denver District Court, former GEO
employee Celia Ramirez alleges the company failed to follow its own
anti-discrimination policies. According to the suit, filed in December,
Ramirez was employed by GEO as a detention officer at the Aurora ICE lockup
for just over two years before being fired for failing to return lockup
keys to their designated area. However, in the suit Ramirez contends that
another GEO worker, Jennifer Beauman, took the keys and placed them on the
facility's roof to retaliate against the plaintiff for reporting the
employee for inappropriate conduct. According to the suit, Beauman is
reported to have engaged in erratic behavior, such as angrily slamming
doors and flicking lights on and off in the presence of inmates. Attempts
to reach Beauman were unsuccessful. The suit alleges Beauman
"joked" about taking the keys to get back at Ramirez, before the
keys went missing. A maintenance worker is reported to have later found the
keys on the facility's rooftop. The crux of the lawsuit contends that
Ramirez was discriminated against for her gender and Latino ethnicity, and
that GEO failed to enforce written policies of barring gender or race
discrimination as stipulated in the company's employee handbook. Pablo
Paez, a spokesman for the GEO Group, said that it is the company's
corporate policy not to discuss pending litigation. Lisa Sahli, the
attorney who filed the suit, said that Ramirez had obtained another
attorney and that she could not speak further on the case because she is no
longer Ramirez's legal counsel. Attempts to contact Ramirez were also
unsuccessful. The suit comes as GEO is set to expand its Aurora ICE
facility by more than 1000 beds, tripling the current threshold of 400
beds. Ramirez is seeking to bring the case to a jury, according to court
documents.
December 19, 2007 Denver
Post
A private company operating the Colorado immigration detention center in
Aurora plans to sink $72 million into an expansion that will more than
triple the size of the facility based on Senate proposals to expand border
enforcement and bed space for illegal-immigrant detainees. The expansion
would turn the 400-bed facility into a 1,500-bed center, making it second
in size only to the 2,000-bed Raymondville, Texas, site, according to U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Aurora site is in a warehouse area
near East 30th Avenue and Peoria Street. The plan by Florida-based GEO
Group, which owns and operates the facility, has raised concerns among
national and local immigrant- and civil-rights groups and the neighborhood
associations in the area. The expansion is expected to be complete in late
2009. A company spokesman did not return numerous calls, but GEO chairman
and chief executive George Zoley detailed the plan recently in a call with
analysts. GEO estimates the 1,100 new beds will raise an additional $30
million in annual revenue, Zoley said during the call. Opponents of the
plan say their concerns are based partly on the lack of access to internal
audits of the facility and recent government reviews showing inadequacies.
"One of the major issues is that GEO has a really spotty record in
running these sorts of facilities," said Chandra Russo, a community
organizer for the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition. "Our concern
with a private corporation running a prison is that its profits depend on
more prisoners. What is the benefit for the community?" Neighbors are
also worried about real estate values and environmental impact. ICE denies
any connection with the expansion the private company is planning with its own
money, said ICE spokesman Carl Rusnok. Currently, the ICE contract for the
Aurora facility is for 400 beds, but the deal is up for review each year
for the next four years. "If they expand the facility, unless they
modify the contract, there is nothing to say those additional beds would be
used or contracted by ICE," Rusnok said. Still, national and local
immigrant groups are concerned about the expansion at the facility, where
they say reports and audits have been slow or not publicly released. Several
years ago, the National Immigration Law Center asked the courts to demand
that ICE release internal reviews of contract facilities and won. But ICE
has been lax in providing the most recent two years' worth of reviews, said
Karen Tumlin, attorney with NILC. "Until ICE is willing to release all
of the reviews, we don't want to see these levels of expansion," she
said. In July, the Government Accountability Office found problems at
several of the detention centers from May 2006 to May 2007. The GAO did not
find extreme cases but noted issues at 16 of 17 ICE centers with phone
calls to pro bono legal help. In Aurora, the report also found that hold
rooms exceeded capacity and log books were not maintained to show how long
people were in rooms or when they had their last meal. In October 2006,
reviews found the Aurora site in violation for lack of cleanliness in food
service. The report also said the center had portable beds in aisles
because of overcrowding. Rusnok said many of the problems identified by the
GAO have since been rectified and that ICE has no plans based on the Senate
proposal. Zoley, during the call, cited a proposed bill, which provides for
additional funding to increase border-patrol agents and increase detention
bed space by more than 5,000 beds. "We believe that this increase in
bed funding will result in additional opportunities for the private
sector," he said. The Department of Homeland Security expects the
undocumented population, estimated to be around 12 million, to grow by 400,000
annually. The total number of illegal immigrants in administrative
proceedings who spend some time in detention annually increased from 95,702
in 2001 to 283,115 in 2006. Detention bed space increased from 19,702 in
2001 to 27,500 last year. After the first of the year, NILC plans to ask
for a moratorium on expansions of these types of facilities until ICE can
ensure minimum compliance with its standards, Tumlin said.
July 11, 2007 Government
Executive Magazine
In a recent review of federal facilities used to detain suspected illegal
immigrants, the Government Accountability Office found a lack of telephone
access to be a pervasive problem, potentially preventing detainees from
contacting legal counsel, their countries' consulates or complaint
hotlines. The GAO review included visits to 23 detention centers housing
immigrants awaiting adjudication or deportation. The watchdog agency
observed the centers -- run by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement
agency within the Homeland Security Department -- for compliance with
nonbinding national detention standards. Of the 23 facilities GAO reviewed,
17 had telephone systems allowing detainees to make free phone calls
seeking assistance. In 16 of these 17 facilities, however, GAO found
systemic problems hindering phone access. Issues ranged from inaccurate or
outdated numbers posted by the phones to technical problems preventing
completion of calls, the report (GAO-07-875) stated. The review found
instances where the centers fell short of standards in other areas, such as
medical care, use of force and food services, but said these instances did
not necessarily indicate a larger pattern of noncompliance. "While it
is true that the only pervasive problem we identified related to the
telephone system -- a problem later confirmed by ICE's testing -- we cannot
state that the other deficiencies we identified in our visits were
isolated," said Richard Stana, director of homeland security and
justice issues at GAO, in the report. GAO recommended that ICE regularly
update the posted numbers for legal services, consulates and reporting
violations of detainee treatment standards and test phone systems to ensure
that they are in working order. In a response to a draft of the report,
Steven Pecinovsky, director of the Homeland Security Department's
GAO/Office of the Inspector General Liaison Office, said ICE concurred with
its recommendations and had taken immediate steps to implement them. In
particular, ICE has started random testing to ensure the phones can access
the necessary numbers. While GAO did not find evidence of widespread
disregard for national detention standards, there have been recent calls
for more oversight of immigrant detention facilities and codification of
standards. According to the American Bar Association's Commission on
Immigration, the fact that the standards are not codified means "their
violation does not confer a cause of action in court." On Monday, the
American Civil Liberties Union called on Congress to codify the standards,
expressing concern over the causes of death for the 62 immigrants who have
died in ICE custody since 2004. GAO's report cited several instances of
noncompliance in the standards for medical care, but almost all were a
failure to complete the routine physical exams required for all detainees.
The only other issue cited was the failure of one detention center to have
a first aid kit available. The ACLU argued there are far more serious
medical failures occurring in immigrant detention centers. "Inadequate
medical care has led to unnecessary suffering and death," the ACLU
said in a statement. "In addition, there is no mechanism in place for
reporting deaths in immigration detention to any oversight body, including
the [Office of the Inspector General] and, therefore, there are no routine
investigations into deaths in ICE custody."
September 27, 2002
Security guards at the Wackenhut INS detention facility in Aurora quelled a
disturbance Thursday. The disruption was caused by several detainees during
the lunch hour, said Nina Pruneda- Muniz, Denver District spokeswoman for
the Immigration and Naturalization Service. "It got handled in a very
timely manner," Pruneda-Muniz said. "We were able to defuse any
situation from going any further." Agents were determining how many prisoners
were involved and why the confrontation erupted, she said. (Rocky Mountain
News)
Arthur
Gorrie Correctional Centre, Arthur Gorrie, Queensland
Sep 16, 2018 dailymail.co.uk
Prisoner, 21, dies in shared jail cell after being found unconscious by
security guards
A 21-year-old prisoner has died in his Brisbane jail cell after being
found unconscious. The inmate was found by guards in a shared cell at
around 11.30 pm on Saturday at the Arthur Gorrie Correctional Centre.
Prison officers administered CPR but he was declared dead when paramedics
arrived around midnight, a Queensland Corrective Services spokeswoman said
on Sunday. Queensland Police have been notified of the man's death and are
being assisted in their inquiries by Queensland Corrective Services. The
prisoner's death in the shared cell comes after it was revealed in a 2017
report there were around 315 'double-up' cells at the Brisbane prison and
prison population had increased by 35 per cent since 2012. The report also
revealed a 500 per cent increase in serious assault as well as a 700 per
cent spike in sexual assault between 2013 and 2016. One former inmate, who
left the jail in April, said the facility was 'one of the most nastiest and
corrupt prisons I've ever been in,' according to ABC News. In an 18 month period
leading up to September 2017, 37 inmates had attempted suicide - compared
to just two in 2012. A prison officer
at the jail said under the cover of anonymity that overcrowding was a major
reason behind a rise in violence and attempted suicide. They said: 'It's
drastically overcrowded. It seems calm as anything then all of a sudden,
it'll kick-off and some are huge incidents with multiple people involved.
Arthur Gorrie is one of two private prisons in Queensland, managed by GEO
Group Australia.
Mar 23, 2018 4bc.com.au
Handcuff key missing for three days in notorious jail
An investigation is underway after a handcuff key went missing from
Queensland’s Arthur Gorrie jail. Ray Hadley received a tip on Thursday that
the key had been lost on March 15 and wasn’t found until three days later.
It’s the second time in a week the prison’s operator GEO Group has come
under fire. An extendable baton was stolen from guards at Parklea
Correctional Centre last week and still hasn’t been found. Queensland
Corrective Services has released a statement following the incident: “At
about 5pm on March 15, a custodial officer at Arthur Gorrie Correctional
Centre reported a handcuff key missing. A range of searches were conducted
throughout the facility before the key was located on March 18. An
investigation is underway, and, as it is considered a major security
incident, GEO is required to provide a report into the incident to
Queensland Correctional Services.” GEO Group has a history of dismal
administration at the Parklea facility and their contract has now been
terminated.
Sep 29, 2017 couriermail.com.au
Arthur Gorrie and Southern Queensland correctional centre management
contracts out to tender
QUEENSLAND’S high-security private jails, deemed unsafe by staff, are set
for the biggest shake-up in 10 years as management contracts go out to
tender. Arthur Gorrie and Southern Queensland jails could get new
management after the State Government expressed its desire to have a local
operator. However, there are currently no jail management operators in
Queensland, opening the door for international applications. American-based
GEO group currently runs the high-risk Arthur Gorrie and UK-based SERCO
runs Southern Queensland, near Gatton, however both have been criticised
for their management and treatment of staff. Queensland Minister for Police
and Corrective Services Mark Ryan says a “Backing Queensland Jobs” policy
will apply to prison contracts. Staff claim the prisons have become
dangerous to work in, with not enough guards to patrol overcrowded units.
Strikes took place at Arthur Gorrie earlier this year as tensions reached
breaking point, with claims officers were forced to supervise more than 60
inmates. The number of inmates at the jail was yesterday 1175, or more than
30 per cent over capacity. The two providers were given a six-month
contract extension until mid-2018 but Corrections Minister Mark Ryan said
the tender would have a “Backing Queensland Jobs” policy. Potential
operators could include Core Civic, the largest private company in the US,
which has also been criticised for understaffing and violence. One of its
prisons was dubbed “Gladiator School”. Privately run prisons save the State
Government about $10 million a year. A Queensland audit report last year
found it cost the State Government $175 per prisoner a day, but private
operators were about 20 per cent cheaper. Opposition corrections spokesman
Tim Mander said: “This news only adds to the uncertainty around our prisons
which have been turned into fight clubs under Labor because they have
failed to deal with chronic overcrowding.” It’s unclear if the jails will
be advertised as one contract or if they will be separated.
Jul 8, 2017 dailymail.co.uk
High-security Queensland prison enters second day of lockdown amid
claims of overcrowding, drugs and prisoner violence
A Queensland high security prison remains in lockdown after correctives
officers were refused entry by the facility's state government-employed
operators. Arthur Gorrie Correctional Centre in Brisbane's southeast went
into lockdown at 6am on Friday over an industrial relations dispute. The
lockdown started when 40 corrections officers were refused entry to the
establishment after a long-running dispute over work conditions. It comes
amid ongoing enterprise bargaining negotiations between staff and the state
government contracted GEO Group. United Voice spokesman Damien Davie said
GEO Group had formally notified union members the staff lockout would
continue on Saturday, reported Sky News. Mr Davie said prison staff had
called on the company to boost staff numbers to deal with overcrowding.
'There's currently one officer to between 36 and 40 (inmates), and
sometimes as bad as one to 62. There should be two on the floor at all
times.' He said staff shortages had led to assaults on officers, prisoner
violence, drugs in the prison going undetected and prisoner behaviour not
being properly addressed. A spokesman for Queensland Corrective Services
said it would not seek to interfere or influence EBA negotiations. 'In the
event of industrial action, GEO is responsible to ensure the safe and
secure operation of the facility,' said in a statement. Responding to
concerns that staff and inmate safety would be put at greater risk once the
lockdown was lifted, GEO Group spokesman Ken Davis said on Friday they
planned to cool heightened tensions among inmates with icecream. 'I don't know what (the prison manager)
will do when he lifts it ... we can go out and buy them ice creams or something
like that for their dessert,' Mr Davis said. A correctional officer at the centre said
it currently housed around 1200 inmates, despite having a single bed
capacity for 890 men with a maximum security wing for up to 18 inmates. 'In
the last couple of months we've had an officer knocked unconscious,' he
said. The officer told AAP the flow of undetected drugs had also risen, the
most common being Subutex, generally used to treat opioid addiction but
abused by inmates. He also said requests to double staff numbers and
address a culture of bullying had been ignored. 'There is a culture of
bullying from management and it comes down through the supervisors,' he
said. 'They just don't seem to want to hear about it. They, I believe, are
more concerned about their profits.' GEO Group spokesman Ken Davis declined
to provide the current officer to inmate ratio, referred questions about
staffing to the state government and denied bullying claims. He said only
two reports of bullying had been made in the 2016/17 financial year and
that both were found to be unsubstantiated. Mr Davis also denied Mr Davie's
claims staff assaults were under-reported and said additional officers were
brought on when the prison was over-crowded.
Jul 7, 2017 dailymail.co.uk
That should help them chill out! Security says it will give ICECREAM to
angry inmates at locked down high security prison
A company employed by the Queensland government to manage a
high-security prison in lockdown over an industrial relations dispute says
it will cool heightened-tensions among inmates with ice cream. The Arthur
Gorrie Correction Centre in Brisbane's southeast went into lockdown about
6am on Friday when 40 corrections officers were refused entry due to a
long-running dispute over work conditions. It comes amid ongoing enterprise
bargaining negotiations between staff and the state government contracted
GEO Group. Responding to concerns that staff and inmate safety would be put
at greater risk once the lockdown was lifted, GEO Group spokesman Ken Davis
said the prison's general manager would buy prisoners ice cream. 'I don't
know what (the prison manager) will do when he lifts it ... we can go out
and buy them ice creams or something like that for their dessert,' Mr Davis
said. United Voice spokesman Damien Davie said staff had called on the
company to boost staff numbers to deal with overcrowding. 'There's
currently one officer to between 36 and 40 (inmates), and sometimes as bad
as one to 62. There should be two on the floor at all times. 'That is
leading to assaults on our members, it's leading to prisoner violence,
drugs in the prison going undetected, prisoner behaviour not being
corrected, just sheerly due to the lack of boots on the ground.' A
correctional officer at the centre said it currently housed around 1200
inmates, despite having a single bed capacity for 890 men with a maximum
security wing for up to 18 inmates. 'In the last couple of months we've had
an officer knocked unconscious,' he said. The officer told AAP the flow of
undetected drugs had also risen, the most common being Subutex, generally
used to treat opioid addiction but abused by inmates. He also said requests
to double staff numbers and address a culture of bullying had been ignored.
'There is a culture of bullying from management and it comes down through
the supervisors,' he said. 'They just don't seem to want to hear about it.
They, I believe, are more concerned about their profits.' GEO Group
spokesman Ken Davis declined to provide the current officer to inmate
ratio, referred questions about staffing to the state government and denied
bullying claims. He said only two reports of bullying had been made in the
2016/17 financial year and that both were found to be unsubstantiated. Mr
Davis also denied Mr Davie's claims staff assaults were under-reported and
said additional officers were brought on when the prison was over-crowded.
A spokesman for Queensland Corrective Services said it would not seek to
interfere or influence EBA negotiations. 'In the event of industrial
action, GEO is responsible to ensure the safe and secure operation of the
facility,' said in a statement.
Jun 25, 2017 ouriermail.com.au
Raw sewage dumped behind Arthur Gorrie Correctional Centre after jail
sewage pump failure
A TRUCK shipped sewage out of a Brisbane jail for weeks after a pump
“mechanical failure” in one of the cell blocks. The Courier-Mail has been
told the truck dumped the waste near railway lines behind Arthur Gorrie
Correctional Centre after the breakdown in “Whiskey Block”. The Department
of Environment and Heritage Protection was notified. “A sewage truck pumped
out tanks every two hours and dumps raw sewage,” a prison source said,
claiming it was at risk of flowing into the nearby creek. “In one of the
prisoner blocks the sewerage system has been broken for months.” The Arthur
Gorrie Correctional centre in Wacol. The waste was reportedly dumped near
the railway line behind the jail. The truck was used to pick up the waste
and dump it for up to 12 hours a day for weeks before a pump was fixed this
month. A Queensland Corrective Services spokeswoman confirmed there was a
mechanical failure of a sewage pump. Questions about costs, how much was
transported and if environmental reports were gathered were not answered.
The jail is run privately by GEO Group but the Department of Public Works
looks after facilities. “The pump was repaired as quickly as possible,” the
QCS spokeswoman said. “For a period of time sewage was transported off
site. We are not aware of any effluent spillage.” The Department of
Environment and Heritage Protection was advised the sewage pump station
overflow released an unknown amount of untreated wastewater to land, a day
after it happened in April. “The Department of Housing and Public Works
reported that the contaminant had been contained on-site and was not released
to the receiving environment,” a spokesman said. “Appropriate steps were
taken to isolate and clean the area.” The jail’s management also engaged
environmental consultants to help with the clean up. “The potential for
environmental harm was low and no further compliance action is required at
this stage,” the spokesman said. It comes as 10-year contracts for Arthur
Gorrie and Southern Queensland jails are about to end. The Courier-Mail has
been told they are likely to get a one-year extension – without it
necessarily being put out to tender. A spokeswoman said “commercial
in-confidence applies to all government contracts”. “QCS strictly adheres
to all guidelines around the conclusion of contracts and the tendering
process.”
Aug 14, 2014
brisbanetimes.com
A prison officer at Arthur Gorrie Correctional
Centre has been stood down after she publicly raised concerns about
resources and over-crowding at the Wacol prison. United Voice union
delegate Kylie Muscat on Tuesday went public with her concerns following
the assault of a fellow prison officer on Friday morning. She said
overcrowding, under-resourcing and a prisoners' smoking ban had made
conditions for prison staff unsafe. The story was first published by
Fairfax Media about 1.30pm on Tuesday. United Voice prisons co-ordinator
Michael Clifford said within a few hours of that story appearing online Ms
Muscat had been suspended on full pay. “She’s pretty devastated, but she’s
also a very courageous union delegate who knows what she’s doing is the
right thing,” he said. Management of the Arthur Gorrie Correctional Centre
has been outsourced to the Sydney-based GEO Group since 1992. A spokesman
for GEO said the only comment the company would make was that Ms Muscat had
been “suspended for breaching company policy”. Mr Clifford said Ms Muscat
had been suspended as an act of “pure intimidation”. “This is an employer
who should be addressing the safety issues that Kylie is raising. Instead
of addressing the safety issues, they’re attacking the person that’s trying
to have them addressed,” he said. “This is just about intimidating people
into silence. “There’s a lot of talk in this country about free speech, but
there’s a lot of employers who think free speech stops the minute you walk
inside the workplace, that you don’t have a right to raise these sorts of
issues.” Mr Clifford said Ms Muscat’s actions were protected under the Fair
Work Act section 346, which protects people involved in industrial activity
from “adverse action”. “She is a union delegate – she can and should raise
safety issues and, if they’re not being addressed, she should do whatever
it takes to make sure they are addressed and that’s what she was doing,” he
said. “…Kylie was fulfilling her role as a union delegate and not talking
as an employee of Arthur Gorrie Correctional Centre. “Under the Fair Work
Act, union delegates have rights to pursue the industrial interests of
their members without any adverse action from employers. “So, our union
will be writing to GEO today. They can expect a letter from our lawyers
identifying that we believe they are in breach of those provisions of the
act and we’ll be asking them to cease any action they’re taking against
Kylie.” The GEO spokesman would not comment on United Voice’s claim the
move breached the Fair Work Act. Mr Clifford said the union would back Ms
Muscat “100 per cent of the way”. “It’s not just Kylie,” he said. “All
union delegates and members know that they have the right to speak up about
safety issues in the workplace, particularly when those safety issues are
life threatening.”
November 24, 2013
heraldsun.com.au
YEARS in US and Thai jails, a book published
about his drug smuggling exploits - resumes don't come much more colourful
than Phil Sparrowhawk's. Yet when he applied for a job at Brisbane's Arthur
Gorrie Correctional Centre, nobody bothered to ask about his dark
international past. Sparrowhawk, who managed to humiliate prison
authorities by working undetected under their noses for three years,
revealed yesterday just how easily he pulled off the extraordinary security
breach. And in another damning twist, The Sunday Mail can reveal the prison
management's claim on Friday that Sparrowhawk worked only as an
administration clerk and had no prisoner contact was wrong. Yesterday the
red-faced jail was forced to admit Sparrowhawk interviewed incoming
prisoners daily and held roles which allowed him to access all prisoners'
files and records. In an exclusive interview with The Sunday Mail, Philip
Sparrowhawk has revealed how he even worked with prisoners as a corrective
services officer inside the jail. Sparrowhawk, the subject of a Random
House book, Grass, about his former international drug smuggling lifestyle,
says nobody at the jail ever asked him any questions about his past.
Although prison managers GEO on Friday claimed Sparrowhawk only worked as
an administration clerk, with no prisoner contact, it has now confirmed he
had daily contact with prisoners. GEO spokesman Ken Davis said yesterday
Sparrowhawk was an administration clerk, but also worked in sentence
management administration and as a prisoner classification specialist. The
jobs allowed him access to all prisoners' files and computer records and he
interviewed incoming prisoners. Mr Davis said once the prison became aware
of internet stories about him being a drug smuggler and ex-prisoner, checks
revealed no evidence he was involved with drugs in jail. "I do deny I
was a drug smuggler. I was never convicted of anything,'' Sparrowhawk says.
"If you are asked have you ever killed anybody you don't say 'yes I
have', you say 'I've never been convicted of it'.'' Sparrowhawk, who worked
in Arthur Gorrie from March, 2010, was suspended in September and sacked
three weeks ago, says he had nothing to do with drugs inside the jail. When
asked why he wanted to work in a Queensland jail after having been in
overseas prisons he says he just wanted a job and he loved the work.
"I never abused my position at GEO," he said. "I took every
available course and test available … and passed all requirements''
Sparrowhawk says he was arrested in Thailand, held in jails there and then
extradited to the US where he was charged with racketeering as part of a
criminal organisation. After five years of being moved between more than 40
jails, he says the charge was dropped. Sparrowhawk claims there are "a
lot of people working at Arthur Gorrie who are involved with a criminal
organisation''. Speaking about how he got his prison job so easily he said:
"You fill out an application form and I answered it truthfully''.
Sparrowhawk is cagey when questioned about the book, which claims he was a
large-scale cannabis dealer from Thailand who was targeted by the US Drug
Enforcement Agency. He says the book, which has his name on the cover, was
written by others and any money he received he donated to charity. Former
UK drug lord and convicted racketeer Howard Marks, known as Mr Nice, who is
a friend of Sparrowhawk, referred to him on the book cover as "Mr
Big''. Sparrowhawk hints at having been involved with British secret
intelligence service MI6, as does Marks. When asked about it he says:
"I've worked for a lot of people and I've signed a lot of these
official secret acts for a lot of different countries.'' Sparrowhawk says
he has left Australia and is about to take up a consultancy for a security
agency in Vienna.
March 11, 2010 ABC
Queensland's Indigenous community will march on State Parliament today,
enraged over the circumstances surrounding a recent death in custody. An
18-year-old prisoner died late last month and there are claims Brisbane
jail staff denied him adequate medical treatment even though he was too
sick to walk. Today's march coincides with the reopened inquest into the
controversial Palm Island death in custody. Prison chaplain Reverend Alex
Gator says inmates at the Arthur Gorrie correctional centre called her with
news of the latest tragedy last month. "This young youth, only 18
years of age, he had spent five weeks on remand and then the five weeks he
was at Arthur Gorrie he became ill, so he was ill for six days," she
said. "The first time he'd gone to the medical centre he was given
Panadol, other times he'd gone he was told that there was nothing wrong
with him. So he was repeatedly denied medical assistance. "Towards the
end the boys had to carry him, the Murri boys in his unit had to carry him,
because he could hardly walk. "They nearly caused a riot, the Murri
boys. They yelled out to the officer, 'get him to the hospital' because
something was wrong with him. "And one officer made the comment, 'Well
if he can go to the toilet, there's nothing wrong with him'." Reverend
Gator says the teenager was ultimately rushed to hospital and put on life
support. But he died a few days later on February 20. "I conducted a
memorial service. The boys said they only saw him a couple of weeks ago
talking, laughing, joking and next thing they hear this young man is
dead," she said. Reverend Gator says the teenager should never have
been put in jail because he had a serious pre-existing medical condition. "That
is the question we're asking - why? Why was he in prison, not in hospital?
I mean he wasn't a terrorist, a paedophile, rapist or a murderer," she
said. "He was in there for a misdemeanour. And as far as I'm
concerned, it's just racial discrimination towards Aboriginal people. This
is about racial hatred attitudes towards Aboriginal people. "They're
deliberately turned away and told there's nothing wrong with them. And
Corrective Services have failed in their duty of care to provide a service
to this young man." 'Could have been avoided' -- Brisbane Indigenous
community leader Sam Watson says news of the death in custody has spread
like wildfire. "We are very concerned about this because this appears
to be yet another Aboriginal death in custody that could have been avoided,
that should have been avoided," he said. Queensland Corrective
Services has issued a written statement saying "there are no
suspicious causes" in the teenager's death. The statement adds that
all deaths in custody are referred to the coroner and to the chief
inspector of prisons for investigation. But Mr Watson says the Indigenous
community is calling on the Queensland Government to instigate a full
coronial inquest. "There have to be a lot of questions answered. We
want to get to the bottom of this and we want to do it very, very
quickly," he said.
June 1, 2008 Courier Mail
A CAREER criminal on remand for assault was accidentally released from a
privately run Brisbane jail last week. Three prison staff have been
suspended over the security bungle at the Arthur Gorrie correctional centre
at Wacol in Brisbane's west. Prison sources said the breach occurred when
staff were processing the inmate for release into police custody. Police
had been granted a court order to remove the inmate on Tuesday in relation
to a break-and-enter investigation. However, prison staff discharged the
inmate for release and gave him his property. Police arrived to collect him
from a high-security area at the rear of the jail, which is used for
transferring inmates, but they were directed to the reception area.
Queensland Corrective Services denied the man was wrongfully discharged,
saying the jail's operator, the GEO Group Australia, had reported there had
been a "breach of internal security procedures". She said at no
time was the inmate, who has since been returned to the jail, not in prison
or police custody. She confirmed jail management suspended three staff as a
result of an internal report on the incident and an investigation was under
way. State Opposition prisons spokesman Vaughan Johnson demanded a full
investigation into the incident, saying the jail had mismanaged the
custodial process.
January 19, 2008 ABC
Prison guards who walked off the job at Queensland's biggest remand
centre yesterday are now back at work. Brisbane's Arthur Gorrie
Correctional Centre had been locked down since Friday afternoon, with only
a skeleton management team running the centre and police patrolling the
perimetre. The guards began their strike after being ordered to stop
handcuffing prisonners with their hands behind their backs. The remand
facility operators, Geo, had requested a hearing before the Industrial
Relations Commission this morning, but Geo spokesman Pierre Langford says
Geo and the Miscellaneous Workers Union representing the guards will
instead continue their talks on Monday. "I suppose I would like to say
on behalf of Geo Group Australia that we appreciate the assistance that the
commission has provided us with today," he said. "At this point
in time the parties have agreed to get back together early next week, to
have further discussions and our employees have returned to work today, so
we're pleased with that."
October 25, 2006 Townsville Bulletin
A TENDER for the state's two privately-run prisons is not a criticism of
the current operators, the Queensland Government said today. Corrective
Services Minister Judy Spence said new tenders to run Borallon and Arthur
Gorrie correctional centres, valued at a total of $200 million, would
ensure taxpayers got value for money. "It is not about the performance
of the current operators,'' Ms Spence said. The
has been under fire in recent years
over a number of deaths in custody, security failures and assaults on
prisoners by staff. Borallon made headlines four years ago when a report
showed it had the highest rate of illicit drug use in the state, with
almost one in three prisoners using drugs. Four companies will be invited
to tender: GEO Group Australia Pty Ltd, GSL Australia Pty Ltd, Management
and Training Corporation Pty Ltd and Serco Australia Pty Ltd. GEO currently
operates Arthur Gorrie, and Management and Training Corporation operates
Borallon. Ms Spence said the contracts would be for five years, with an
option for Queensland Corrective Services to extend them for a further five
years. The tenders will be evaluated in the first half of next year with
new contracts to start on January 1, 2008. An independent probity auditor
has been contracted to oversee the entire project.
November 30, 2005 Australian
THE bonus and penalty system on which private prisons in Australia are run
has been accused of encouraging operators to cover up riots and drug abuse
by prisoners. Queensland Prison Officers Association secretary Brian Newman
yesterday accused private prison operators of covering up incidents in
their facilities that could threaten performance bonuses worth up to
$500,000 a year. "Nine years ago I worked at Arthur Gorrie
(Correctional Centre at Wacol, west of Brisbane) and I would make drug
finds but the drugs would be flushed down the toilet in front of me by
senior officials," Mr Newman said. "You were powerless to do
anything about it. "Anecdotal evidence given to me is that it still
goes on today. There is no incentive for privately run prisons to report
incidents." The management contract of Arthur Gorrie operator, the GEO
Group, formerly known as Australasian Correctional Management, with the
Queensland Government provides a $500,000 performance bonus to prevent
crime, drug abuse and riots. The Arthur Gorrie contract, a copy of which
has been obtained by The Australian, says the $500,000 bonus will be
reduced by $100,000 for each escape, "loss of control (riot)" or
death in custody. Penalties of $25,000 are also imposed for a string of
problems such as discharging a prisoner in error, assaults by prisoners
resulting in injury or a case of self-harm or attempted suicide. Other
incidents that incur the $25,000 penalty include serious industrial
injuries, deliberately lit fires, major security breaches such as attempted
escapes or hostage-taking and loss of high-risk restricted articles. If
random urine tests disclose that drug use in the prison is higher than 9
per cent and does not reduce towards the target of 4per cent, the penalty
applicable is also $25,000. The bonuses and penalty provisions are the same
for the contracts the GEO Group, the Australian subsidiary of the
Miami-based Wackenhut, has with the Victorian and NSW governments to run
the Melbourne Custody Centre and the Fulham and Junee prisons. Mr Newman
said his association had asked the Queensland Government to conduct an
inquiry into allegations by staff at Arthur Gorrie that
"incidents" had been covered up "to avoid financial penalty
to breach of contract". GEO Group is paid almost $800 a week for each
of the 710 prisoners housed at Arthur Gorrie. A spokesman for Queensland
Corrective Services Minister Judy Spence yesterday confirmed that contracts
for privately run prisons did provide for performance bonuses.
"However, we are not able to confirm amounts or any details on
payments or deductions regarding the bonuses as these matters are
commercial in confidence," he said. Col Kelaher, GEO Group executive
manager of operations, said he could not comment on the contract with the
Government.
January
26, 2005 South-West News
WORKERS at the Arthur Gorrie Correctional Centre at Wacol staged a strike
from noon Friday to 5pm on Saturday over a wages and conditions dispute.
The Liquor Hospitality and Miscellaneous Union accused correctional centre
owners GEO Group of not meeting its obligations under the Queensland
Industrial Relations Act. Union prisons organiser David Pullen said the
centre's 700 prisoners were locked down in cells during the strike. GEO
group managing director Pieter Bezuidenhout said the action ended after an
IRC officer recommended a return to work.
December
24, 2004 Courier Mail
QUEENSLAND'S prisons are overcrowded and urgently require more funding
to stop the growing number of inmate deaths, a report by a state coroner
has found. The findings came at the end of an inquiry
into the suicide of prisoner William Mark Bailey in November 2002 at the
Arthur Gorrie Correctional Centre. Deputy state coroner Christine Clements
found no one else was responsible for Bailey's death and recommended no
further action. Arthur
Gorrie, a remand and reception centre that temporarily holds prisoners
awaiting court hearings, can hold up to 800 people. It is managed by GEO
Group Australia but owned by the Queensland Corrective Services department.
"Evidence was given that there are 250 cells at Arthur Gorrie but at
the time of the inquest there were 750 prisoners being held at the
facility," Ms Clements said.
Auckland
Central Remand Prison
September 28, 2009 NZCity
Further doubt is being cast on the claimed efficiency of privately run
prisons. The Green Party's pointing to evidence presented during Selected
Committee hearings on private prisons legislation about the historical cost
of the Auckland Remand Prison when it was in private hands. The Greens say
it shows the cost per prisoner was over $57 thousand a year compared to
around $50 thousand in the public system. The party says it proves there
can be no justification for claims private prisons are cheaper than public
ones. Meanwhile, special monitors are being proposed as part of the
oversight for privately run prisons. Parliament's Law and Order Select
Committee has reported back on the private prisons bill and is recommending
additional checks and balances be put in place. It advises special monitors
employed by the Department of Corrections be given free and unfettered
access to the facilities to ensure proper standards are met. The Committee
also recommends all private prison operators be required to comply with
instructions from the Chief Executive of the Corrections Department.
July 31, 2009 Radio New Zealand
ACT MP David Garrett says he does not believe he intimidated two
submitters to Parliament's law and order select committee, as alleged by
the Labour Party. Labour Party MP Clayton Cosgrove believes Mr Garrett
breached parliamentary privilege when he told two prison guards their
submission would stop them from getting a job in a privately run prison. He
says Mr Garrett's behaviour was shameful, and brought the select committee
process into disrepute. Mr Cosgrove says the guards had experience working
under private prison management and were providing expert opinions.
Corrections Minister Judith Collins has also weighed in, saying the
comments were totally inappropriate. But Mr Garrett says it was never his
intention to intimidate, and he is looking forward to responding to
Labour's complaint. Speaker of the House Lockwood Smith will decide whether
to refer the matter to Parliament's privileges committee.
July 29, 2009 3 News
An MP from government confidence and supply party ACT today told prison
officers who spoke out against private prisons that they had hurt their
future job prospects. David Garrett's remark came hot on the heals of
accusations yesterday that the Government attempted to intimidate and
silence people. Those claims were sparked by Social Development Minister
Paula Bennett releasing benefit details of two women who criticised a
government decision to cut a training allowance. Today a group of prison
officers, representing 30 officers who had previously worked for a
privately run prison, made a submission to Parliament's law and order
select committee which is considering legislation to enable private
operators to run prisons. After Bart Birch, Uaea Leavasa and Satish Prasad
criticised how Auckland Central Remand Prison was run under private
contractor GEO Ltd between 2000 and 2005, Mr Garrett weighed in. "You
say that you don't want to go back to working in this environment - to the
private (sector). You'd be aware that given your submission here, you
wouldn't get offered a job anyway, would you?" Other MPs on the
committee were visibly disturbed by the remark and National's Shane Ardern
was quick to reassure the men they should feel free to speak their minds
before a committee of Parliament. "Can I say from my own party you can
sit here without fear or favour," he said. Acting chairman on the
committee Labour MP Clayton Cosgrove added his support for Mr Ardern's
remark. Corrections Association of New Zealand president Beven Hanlon told
NZPA he thought the remark out of line. The union already had concerns
about Mr Garrett's involvement in the Sensible Sentencing Trust which
advocates for tougher and longer sentencing. "All the things that
private prisons advocate for," he said. "For him to then threaten
staff over (their) future employment is a great concern." Mr Cosgrove
described the comment as "Bennett mark two". "(People)
should be able to come to a select committee without fear or favour to give
their view." Mr Garrett's tone had been badgering and he carried that
style on when other submitters made presentations, Mr Cosgrove said.
"I think he needs to learn that we live in a democracy and in a
democracy ... you're allowed to have a view and we should (give) people the
respect of actually listening. "But he's behaving like a bully and I
guess it is Paula Bennett mark two." Mr Garrett stood by his comment
when questioned by media. "They were quite clearly extremely negative
about the private prison managing company. It would seem to be most
unlikely they would get a job with that company." He agreed the select
committee process should be open and MPs should not stymie free exchange
but did not think he had affected that. "They have the right to say
whatever they like ... I didn't see I was stymying free debate at
all." Asked why he felt compelled to talk about the officers' job
prospects rather than ask questions about the bill, Mr Garrett said their
motives were relevant and he had no regrets. "It was certainly no attempt
to stifle the debate." Mr Garrett walked away when NZPA asked him to
comment on the union view it was a threatening remark. In their submission,
the officers said they had worked both for GEO and the Corrections
Department. Under private management the focus was on protecting the
company's reputation. They said under GEO staff were told to resign rather
than have negligence revealed, an incident where a woman allegedly helped a
relative escape was not investigated, and systems were not robust in areas
like drug control and suicide. Another complaint was that GEO paid less for
local workers and used contractors from Australia to fill gaps who were on
salaries as much as $30,000 higher. Those contractors appeared unaware of
cultural issues for Maori and Pacific inmates. Other casual workers were
used and had lower levels of training and experience than full time staff
who were not familiar with the prison, which raised risk levels.
July 1, 2009 The National Business Review
The State should be responsible for prisoners not private companies, the
Human Rights Commission said today. Chief Human Rights Commissioner Rosslyn
Noonan appeared before Parliament's law and order select committee which is
considering the Corrections (Contract Management of Prisons Amendment)
Bill. Senior managers from private prison company GEO Group were present
and heard groups condemn their business. The firm ran Auckland Central
Remand Prison (ACRP) for five years until Labour won the 1999 election and
refused to renew its contract. Ms Noonan said protecting the rights of
detainees was a key function of government and should not be contracted
out. "The management of prisons involves the exercise of some of the
state's most coercive powers against individuals," the commission's
submission said. "There should be direct accountability for the
exercise of such powers. A government department directly accountable to a
minister provides the clearest accountability." If the bill was to go
ahead the commission wanted its monitoring measures beefed up.
Recommendations included protecting staff from being sacked if they gave
information to monitors and permitting prisoners to complain directly to
monitors. Also prisons should be required to comply with international
conventions around torture. Ms Noonan said early intervention would make
the biggest difference. She called for willingness across parties not to
make political capital out of the issue. Catholic organisation Caritas was
concerned problems in the United States' private prisons -- such as
beatings, rapes, suicides and other deaths in custody -- would be repeated
here. It noted that in the US the same people running private prisons were
also involved in lobbying government for longer sentences. GEO Group
Australia managing director Pieter Bezuidenhout said his company had
managed prisons in Australia for 17 years, operating in Queensland,
Victoria and New South Wales.
July 19, 2006 NewstalkZB
The Government has no plans to privatise prisons. United Future leader
Peter Dunne has asked about the Government's plans for prisons following a
Treasury report revealing each inmate costs $77,000 a year to be cared for.
The report recommends competition for prison services be introduced.
Corrections Minister Damien O'Connor is ruling out privatisation. He says
it is $10,000 a year cheaper to keep inmates in public prisons than the
private Auckland Central Remand Prison.
July 19, 2005 Stuff
An inmate in Auckland's former private prison who stowed away in a shipping
container to depart New Zealand should be sent back here to face rape
charges, says a Fiji court. The Suva Magistrate's Court recommended
that Shumendra Nilesh Chandra, 30, a computer operator, of Auckland be sent
back to New Zealand. Australasian Correctional Management,
which managed Auckland Central Remand Prison until its contract expired
recently, had to pay the Government $50,000 for the escape, under the terms
of its contract. The company said at the time that its investigation
into how Chandra allegedly slipped his handcuffs and fled guards was unable
to find out how he did it.
July 13, 2005 Scoop
The return today of New Zealand's only privately run prison to public
sector management is an opportunity for the Corrections Department to prove
it can deliver a first-class service, Green Party Justice Spokesperson
Nandor Tanczos says. The Department took over management of Auckland
Central Remand Prison from the GEO Group at midnight last night. "The
Green Party welcomes the handover today of the management of the Auckland
Central Remand Prison to the public sector," Nandor says. "I call
on new Corrections Department CEO Barry Matthews to use this as an
opportunity to deliver best prison practice. There is no reason why the
public sector can't provide a better service than the private and now is
the time for Mr Matthews to demonstrate this. "International
experience shows widespread abuse and poor conditions in many privately run
prisons. ACRP was clearly a loss leader designed to be a foot in the door
for the private prison conglomerates. It is extremely unlikely that any
further private prisons here would all be run as well as ACRP was by Mr
Karauria and his team. "But
the principle issue is that prisons must be run by the public sector. As
one of the most tangible manifestations of state power, they must be fully
accountable to the people of New Zealand. A profit-driven service is
ultimately only accountable to its overseas shareholders. "There
have been some clear cases of this lack of accountability in Australia. For
example ACM, the predecessor to Geo, placed a contractual obligation upon
some of their staff to not provide information to the judiciary, which
would have the effect of inhibiting the investigation of abuse and
mismanagement. "It must also be remembered that private prisons can
have a corrupting influence on the political system, in that they create a
profit motive to the lobby for longer custodial sentences. "The Green
Party have taken a number of steps to increase accountability in the public
sector through changes to the Corrections Act and a written commitment to
the establishment of an independent prison inspectorate from the Labour-led
Government," Nandor says.
July 13, 2005 Scoop
The Public Service Association (PSA) is welcoming the return of the
Auckland Central Remand Prison to the public prisons service. The Public
Service Association (PSA) is New Zealand’s largest state sector union, and
has a growing membership at the Department of Corrections. The contract
between the Department and Australasian Correctional Management Limited to
run the remand prison expired overnight. It will now be run by the
Department of Corrections. PSA National Secretary Brenda Pilott said
workers employed by the private prison operator had, in effect, made the
operation profitable since they were employed on poorer terms and
conditions than the rest of the nation’s prison staff. “Imprisoning people
for the crimes they have committed is a core role of the state and it
should never be hived off to a private operator for profit. “The ACRP experiment
proved that the exercise was a simple cost-cutting exercise of the type
imposed across the public sector during the 1990s. “It employed fewer
officers per inmate and paid them less than staff employed by Corrections
at all the other prisons across the country. “At a time when Corrections is
finding it increasingly difficult to recruit and retain quality staff it
beggars belief that National would advocate greater use of private prison
contracts. More private prisons would inevitably drag down pay and
conditions for all prison staff and make recruitment even harder. “National’s advocacy of tougher, longer sentences
for a wider range of offences means it must be planning to employ many more
prison staff. We have to ask who they think is going to staff them?,”
Brenda Pilott said.
July 13, 2005 New Zealand Herald
Prisons run by private companies are not an option, Corrections Minister
Paul Swain says. Opposition parties
have said that ending private participation in the prison system is a
triumph of ideology over commonsense, but Mr Swain said the simple issue
was that private companies should not make profits out of prisoners.
However, Auckland Central Remand Prison (ACRP) was well managed before it
was handed back to the state today. "In the end, we have a public
prison service, a public police force, a public courts system," he
said on National Radio. "This is a role the Government or the public
should be involved in, not the private sector."
July
12, 2005 Scoop
The GEO Group, holders of the private management
contract for the Auckland Central Remand Prison, said today that although
they were extremely disappointed that the contract had come to a close they
would like to thank all of those people who have supported them during
their time in New Zealand. The contract ends at midnight on July 12.
Ault Correctional Facility, Ault, Colorado
May 9, 2007 Greeley Tribune
Plans for a private prison in Ault came to a halt recently when Colorado
Department of Corrections rescinded its offer to GEO Group. Ault Mayor Brad
Bayne said board members haven't discussed the prison for months.
"Until there was some sort of guarantee, we'd just rather not talk
about it," he said. "There is probably some disappointment from
me and a few board members who believe we still could have made it work for
the town." Talk of the 1,500-bed medium-security prison proposed last
spring has bought some uproar in the town of fewer than 1,500 residents.
Some said a prison coming to town would boost the town's economy, but
others said it would be too dangerous because of its proximity to the town.
The plan was to build on 40 acres in the southeast part of town. Last
spring, the GEO Group entered into a tentative agreement with the town --
which approved the prison in concept only -- so it could secure state
approval to build there. Months later, the town board passed an ordinance
requiring resident approval before any prison could be built. Town
officials haven't heard from a GEO Group representative since September,
when GEO hosted a public forum answering questions from residents, he said.
But DOC Executive Director Ari Zavaras put a stop to all discussions with
the private prison contractor. He sent a letter April 24 to representatives
of GEO Group, stating they would no longer discuss the plans for the Ault
prison or GEO's request for a guaranteed bed count. "We had continued
to have a very open and productive conversations with GEO," said
Allison Morgan, spokesperson for the DOC. "But we did not agree with a
bed guarantee." GEO requested a guarantee on the number of beds that
would be filled by prisoners at any given time, since the state pays
private prison contractors a daily rate per inmate. Phillip Tidwell, a
member of the Citizens Against Ault Prison, said the decision to rescind
the DOC offer to GEO Group made him happy. "We're definitely feeling
this is a responsible act from both parties," Tidwell said. "The
contract should have never been fulfilled by the state because of GEO making
the specifications with the state for a guaranteed bed count." In the
letter to rescind, Zavaras stated that in June 2006, the DOC offered a
contract with GEO Group with the exception to GEO's request for a bed
guarantee. On July 7, the DOC asked for GEO group to sign and complete the
proposed implementation agreement. After a few meetings, GEO Group still
requested a bed guarantee, which the DOC could not grant. The two entities
have gone back and forth on the bed guarantee issue since August. According
to the letter, Zavaras gave GEO a new deadline of April 2 to sign the
Implementation Agreement or provide a reason for not signing in writing to
the DOC no later than that date. "It was apparent the Department and
GEO could not come to an agreement," Morgan said.
April 18, 2007 Colorado For Ethics
The Colorado Department of Corrections (CDOC) responded to a March 5, 2007,
open records request by Colorado Citizens for Ethics in Government (CCEG)
that sought documents relating to a private prison contract awarded by CDOC
to The GEO Group, Inc. The documents obtained by CCEG confirm that former
Director of Prisons Nolin Renfrow began working for The GEO Group while
still on state payroll, a blatant conflict of interest. In an email to
Brian Burnett, the deputy executive director of CDOC, Dave Schouweiler, DOC
Manager of Purchasing, stated that Renfrow was on state payroll until
January 31, 2006 and acknowledged the “impropriety of Mr. Renfrow’s
involvement with the originating procurement.” The CORA request and
responsive documents are available on CCEG’s website at
www.coloradoforethics.org. CCEG is posting these records as part of its
commitment to holding the government responsible for its actions.
March 6, 2007 Greeley Tribune
Saying GEO Group Inc. can't be trusted, a Pueblo lawmaker asked state
officials Monday to rescind a contract with the company to build a private
prison in Ault. Plans for the prison, which would house 1,500 inmates and
would be built east of the railroad tracks along U.S. 85, has stalled on
two fronts. Ault leaders decided they would not approve the facility until
the public voted on it, and GEO wants to change its contract to ensure
payment for its beds. Rep. Liane "Buffie" McFadyen, D-Pueblo
West, a vocal critic of private prisons, said Monday that the proposed
change and other issues regarding GEO's integrity should negate the Ault
contract. “Anybody living in Ault should be concerned that a company that
would bid this way on a contract might have a business in their town,"
she said. Philip Tidwell, spokesman for the town group Coalition Against
Ault Prison, said residents hope no one else bids on the Ault prison if
GEO's contract is rescinded. "We just do not want any private prison,
whether it be GEO or Cornell or anyone else," he said. A spokesman for
GEO did not return calls seeking comment. McFadyen said the company is
attempting to do the same things in Ault that derailed plans for a GEO
facility in Pueblo. In 2003, GEO won a contract for a 1,100-bed, pre-parole
and parole revocation facility in Pueblo, and after almost four years of
delays, the state pulled the contract last fall. The company never broke
ground on the facility. "The state of Colorado was held hostage for
four years waiting for those beds," McFadyen said. The delays included
zoning issues in Pueblo and GEO's attempt to obtain guaranteed payments on
90 percent of its beds, regardless of whether the beds were occupied. That
is something state leaders have opposed and which may even be impossible
because of state laws, McFadyen said. Now, GEO is trying for guaranteed bed
payments in Ault, she said. "You have to question the integrity of the
2006 bid," she said. "If past performance is an indicator, I
suspect we will be in the same place we were in 2003 in Pueblo."
McFadyen said Ari Zavaras, the new director of the Department of
Corrections, told her he is opposed to bed guarantees. Corrections
spokeswoman Alison Morgan told the Associated Press that Zavaras will
review McFadyen's request and decide how to respond. The story of Ault's possible
prison goes back to late 2005, when Nolin Renfrow, former director of
prisons for the Department of Corrections, started working with GEO on a
bid for a private prison. Renfrow is under investigation for using state
sick leave to obtain the Ault contract on behalf of GEO. On Monday,
Colorado Citizens for Ethics in Government, a watchdog group, filed an open
records request about the Ault bid. "We do not feel that the public's
interest was put forth in the procurement of this contract," said
Chantelle Taylor, spokeswoman for the watchdog group. A state audit found
Renfrow's business activities "arguably present a conflict of interest
and result in a breach of ... the public trust." That breach, coupled
with GEO's attempt to change its Pueblo contract by adding the bed-payment
guarantee, should have prevented the company from getting the Ault bid in
the first place, McFadyen said. Tidwell agreed. "One thing the state
should recognize is (GEO) did not operate fairly," he said. "They
hired an insider knowing he worked for the state. In my mind, GEO has shown
itself to be not a company that operates fairly in the state of Colorado.
March 5, 2007 Rocky Mountain News
Rep. Buffie McFadyen, D-Pueblo West, and two reform groups today
formally requested the director of the Department of Corrections and the
governor rescind Geo Group’s bid to build a private prison in Ault. The
reasons cited included the company’s performance on a 2003 bid to build a
private prison in Pueblo. McFadyen said GEO Group lost its contract to
build the Pueblo facility because it delayed the start of construction,
then tried to renegotiate its contract to get a guarantee that it would be
paid for 90 percent occupancy, even if beds were not filled.
"Basically, the state of Colorado was held hostage for four years.
They didn’t even break ground," McFadyen said. In her letter to Ari
Zavaras, executive director of DOC, she said, "It would appear that
the state’s best interests were not served by allowing GEO group to bid any
contract with the state because of its lack of performance on tis 2003
award." Officials with Geo Group could not be reached for comment
Monday afternoon. Alison Morgan, spokeswoman for the DOC, said Zavaras was
aware of the letter being sent by McFadyen, but had not seen it Monday.
"Since he was not with the department during the RFP (request for
proposals) process, it is an issue that he is still studying and is being
briefed on," said Morgan. "Once he has all the information,
including McFadyen’s letter, he would welcome an opportunity to sit down
and talk to her."
December 26, 2006 Greeley Tribune
After the state Department of Corrections pulled its contract with the GEO
Group to build a prison in Pueblo, Ault residents wonder about GEO's
proposed prison plans in their backyard. While some speculate that the
department's decision to pull the contract will halt the company's plans
for Ault, others say it has changed nothing. For Phillip Tidwell, a member
of the Citizens Against Ault Prison, the Department of Correction's decision
in Pueblo was good news for his own fight. "We are elated ... finally
someone will investigate them," he said. "The board is not
calling off anything, but to me, like the DOC, why hasn't Ault pulled out
on our contract with them? They're not truthful, not honest from the
beginning ... Now, we don't feel alone. We will continue our own fight, it
just feels like we're being assisted by the DOC." The contract was
canceled for the Pueblo prison after concern about Geo's lack of progress
on the project. The corrections department said that after four years, the
company failed to respond to inquiries from them and failed to break ground
on the Pueblo facility. In Ault, the state awarded the GEO Group the right
to build a 1,500-bed medium security men's prison on 40 acres in the
southeast part of town. Despite the initial discussions, there still are no
final decisions on the Ault proposal. Ault Mayor Brad Bayne said the
department's decision about the Pueblo facility won't change what's
happening in Ault. "The town hasn't changed its views on this,"
he said. He said for the prison to be built in the town, there has to be a
guarantee from the state, a negotiation between the town and the GEO Group
that makes sense and a vote of residents to approve the plans. Town
officials haven't heard from a GEO Group representative since September
when GEO hosted a public forum answering questions from residents, he said.
"... We're in a holding pattern until the state guarantees the
matter," he added. The plan first came to light at the end of May when
the GEO Group gave a proposal to the Ault Town Board. According to meeting
minutes, representatives from GEO said the project would be funded through
a local government bond, where the state pays the local government, which then
pays GEO. They said the facility would house 1,500 beds, but the request
for proposal on the project would allow up to 2,250 beds. To fight the
project, Citizens Against Ault Prison demanded an injunction on the town's
code which will require a vote of residents to decide the fate of the
prison. The injunction, which was signed by 297 voters, was approved by
board members in November.
December 16, 2006 The Gazette
State prison officials have canceled a contract for a new private
prison in Pueblo, a move that casts doubt on how much Colorado will be able
to rely on private prisons while it copes with a crowding crisis. The GEO
Group, which was awarded a contract in 2003 to build the Pueblo pre-release
prison, has also been contracted to build and operate a prison in Ault, in
northeastern Colorado. But the same issue that doomed the Pueblo project —
the company’s insistence it be guaranteed nearly full occupancy — could
derail the latter prison, because GEO is making a similar demand. “If GEO’s
going to demand a bed guarantee, they need to leave the state,” said state
Rep. Buffie McFadyen, a Pueblo Democrat and leading critic of private
prisons. “It is not the job of the Colorado taxpayers to ensure profits for
this corporation.” The Pueblo prison was delayed repeatedly: by zoning
issues, by a legal challenge from a prison-reform group and by several
revisions to the plan by GEO. But the final impasse began this summer, when
the company asked for a 90 percent minimum occupancy guarantee for the
prison, which wasn’t a condition of the original proposal and was opposed
by Department of Corrections officials. Private prisons are paid a daily
rate per inmate by the state, currently $52. Last month, the DOC denied a
contract-extension request, and on Thursday informed the company that it
was canceling the contract. “Ground has not broken, and GEO has given no
indication when, or even if, it plans to commence construction,” DOC
executive director Joe Ortiz wrote. “Our patience cannot be infinite.” The
department is facing an acute crowding problem. Years of canceled
prison-construction projects and steady growth in court caseloads have
created a shortage of prison beds. The DOC this week began shipping 720
inmates out of state, a temporary solution until new beds become available.
With only one state prison under construction, Colorado State Penitentiary
II in Cañon City, the DOC this year awarded contracts to three companies to
build prisons for 3,776 inmates. The GEO Group’s proposed 1,500-bed prison
in Ault is a major part of the plan. Alison Morgan, head of private-prison
monitoring for the DOC, said the department still expects GEO to follow
through on its proposal in Ault. “We are treating the Pueblo facility and
the Ault facility separately. We have from Day 1, and we will continue to
do so,” Morgan said Friday. However, GEO is making the same demand for
guaranteed occupancy for the Ault prison. Asked whether the DOC is still
opposed to a guarantee, she said, “It is a policy decision to be addressed
by the new administration (of Gov.-elect Bill Ritter) and the General
Assembly.” The local community isn’t even sure it wants a prison. Ault’s
town board last month passed an ordinance requiring voter approval for the
prison. No election date has been set. McFadyen said she doesn’t believe
GEO ever intended to complete the Pueblo prison, and she doubts the
company’s ability and will to follow through in Ault. “We’ve been set back
three years in our planning,” McFadyen said. “I think that kind of delay is
unacceptable, and we’ll learn from this experience and not allow another
contract to drag on for three years.” A call to a spokesman in the
company’s Boca Raton, Fla., headquarters was not returned Friday afternoon.
An audit requested by Mc-Fadyen regarding the bidding process for the Ault
prison was released this week. It showed that a top DOC official set up a
consulting business to help GEO win the bid while he was employed by the
state. Because the DOC is based in Colorado Springs, the office of 4th
Judicial District Attorney John Newsome will receive the results of the
investigation and determine whether any law was broken. Morgan said the DOC
will issue a new request for proposals for a pre-release prison.
December 14, 2006 Pueblo Chieftain
A three-year effort to build a private prison facility at the Pueblo
Memorial Airport Industrial Park appears to be dead after the Colorado
Department of Corrections and the prison company reached an impasse over
guaranteed occupancies. On Tuesday, reports said that the DOC was working
with the attorney general's office to draft a letter to the GEO Group that
essentially kills the company's plans to build a 1,000-bed pre-parole and
parole revocation facility on 36 acres east of the city. GEO officials said
Wednesday they had not received any letter from the DOC, but also didn't
express much confidence a deal could be struck for the facility. "We
have been in negotiations with the Department of Corrections, but we don't
have any contract signed and at this time it does not appear there will be
one," said Pablo Paez, director of communications for the
Florida-based company. Paez confirmed reports from November that the
company was asking for a minimum occupancy guarantee for the facility and
also confirmed that the company was planning to go to the city of Pueblo
for help to build the prison. ± PLEASE SEE PRISON, 2APRISON / continued
from page 1A ± "We needed the guarantee to secure the lowest capital
cost through tax-exempt bonds," Paez said Thursday. "We would get
those through the local municipality." State Rep. Liane
"Buffie" McFadyen, D-Pueblo West, who has been a vocal critic of
the private prison industry, and state Rep. Abel Tapia, D-Pueblo, wrote a
letter to the city in May warning against using public funds to build the
facility. "I think it's very positive that the city of Pueblo is not
going to risk its credit rating on this project," McFadyen said
Wednesday. Officials from the DOC were not available Wednesday to comment
on whether the letter had to do with the occupancy guarantees, or the
result of an audit suggesting former Director of Prisons Nolin Renfrow may
have broken the law by helping GEO secure DOC approval to build a 1,500-bed
facility in Weld County, prior to his retirement in January. Paez said GEO
had no contact with Renfrow before March. Last month, DOC spokeswoman Kathy
Church told The Pueblo Chieftain that talks between the company and the DOC
over Pueblo's facility had stalled over the minimum occupancy guarantees
and had reached a critical point. "They need to either understand our
position and accept it or back out completely," Church said last
month. Church told The Chieftain that the DOC couldn't make any guarantees
without knowing how much money it had to spend. That money depends on what
the joint budget committee decides. McFadyen wondered Wednesday why those
guarantees weren't part of the original agreement when DOC solicited bids
for the Pueblo project. "If the DOC negotiated additional terms with
GEO, they would be the only private prison company to receive such
treatment and that's wrong," McFadyen said Wednesday. "I think
this goes to the point of how committed they were to coming to Pueblo in
the first place." The plans to build the facility started in 2003 when
GEO, then Wakenhut Corrections Company, proposed building the prison on the
West Side. Those plans eventually shifted to the airport and the city
approved a controversial agreement with GEO to build a 500- to 1,000-bed
facility. A year ago, GEO bought the property at the airport from the city
for $296,800. GEO's original plan was to build a 750-bed facility at the
airport, but got Planning and Zoning Approval in May to expand the facility
to 1,000 beds.
December 14, 2006 Denver Post
Results of an investigation into former Colorado prisons director Nolin
Renfrow's conduct in office will be turned over to a district attorney
early next year, the Department of Corrections' inspector general said
Wednesday. Michael Rulo, who has been the agency's inspector general for
seven years, said his office has been cooperating with state auditors on
the probe. On Tuesday, the auditors announced that a "former senior-
level official" of the Department of Corrections launched a
prison-consulting business in August 2005, five months before he retired
from the department Jan. 31, and helped a private company land a state
prison contract. State Rep. Buffie McFadyen, D-Pueblo West, who requested
the audit, identified the official as Renfrow. The auditors found that
while still employed by DOC, Renfrow began working to assist prospective
bidders in developing proposals to his department for a private prison.
With his assistance, a company identified as the GEO Group was awarded the
contract for a 1,500-bed private prison at Ault. Auditors noted that state
employees are barred by law from outside employment that creates a conflict
of interest, and from helping people to win a contract with their agency
for a fee. Renfrow couldn't be reached for comment Wednesday. Rulo said the
results of his office's investigation will be turned over to El Paso County
District Attorney John Newsome, probably in January. The Department of
Corrections is based in that county. Rulo said a decision on whether to
file charges will be a "collaborative process" with prosecutors.
Kristen Holtzman, spokeswoman for Colorado Attorney General John Suthers,
said that Renfrow never contacted the attorney general's office to ask
whether his consulting business while still a DOC employee constituted a
conflict of interest.
November 15, 2006 Greeley Tribune
The Ault Town Board eased many residents' minds Tuesday night and gave
them a stronger voice in the prison debate. Town residents have voiced
strong opinions against the proposed GEO correctional facility in Ault
after initial discussions last spring. Tuesday night, the town board voted
5-1 to accept an ordinance that requires a town election about the location
of any prison or similar incarceration facility. An election date has not
been set, but one will be necessary when the GEO Group Inc. returns to the town
to begin negotiating a contract. GEO has proposed building a 1,500-bed
medium security prison on about 40 acres in southeast Ault. The prison
population would double the town's population. Most recently, the GEO group
sought assurances from the state Department of Corrections for a guaranteed
number of prisoners to house at the prison, but DOC representatives said
the state typically didn't provide such guarantees. Residents recently
signed a petition requesting an election about a site before the town
approved permits for such a building. Petitioners needed a minimum of 40
valid signatures to take the request to the board. They submitted 297. Mary
Schlack, 37, of Ault said she was part of the petition effort after she
went door-to-door and learned more people were opposed to the prison. She
said she expected more than 40 signatures because of her previous questions
to residents.
September 29, 2006 Greeley Tribune
Al Nickel was one of a few passionate people who attended a
question-and-answer session Thursday about a proposed private prison in his
town. He was more concerned about the possible safety risks of having a
prison nearby than the potential for increased revenue. "What are they
going to do for the town?" asked Nickel, a 21-year resident of the town
11 miles north of Greeley on U.S. 85. "It's not like they can go
downtown and buy 100 gallons of milk or toilet paper. Their business has to
go elsewhere." Representatives from The GEO Group, Place Properties
and Patriot Business Solutions met with about 20 residents Thursday
afternoon at the Ault VFW post to discuss the plans of bringing a prison to
town. The group held a separate meeting Thursday night, drawing about 40
people. Many people were curious about what the prison would look like and
had concerns about Ault being considered a prison town. Ken Fortier, a
spokesman for GEO Group, said he hoped to ease some concerns at the
sessions. "There's a lot of emotions when it comes to a project like
this and the perception of a correctional facility," he said.
"We're not here to debate, but to answer questions."
September 10, 2006 Greeley Tribune
Two months ago, the state awarded the Geo Group the right to build a
1,500-bed medium security men's prison in Ault, but so far, progress has
been slight. A town meeting in July lured about 300 in protest. Opponents
worry about prison breaks, the caliber of employees and the potential for a
prison to attract criminals. Proponents of the prison say their dying town
needs development, and a prison is a clean industry that would bring
commerce and jobs. The prison would be located on roughly 40 acres in the
southeast part of town, east of the railroad tracks parallel to U.S. 85.
Since the initial discussions, however, there are still no decisions. The
Geo Group has not presented the town with a potential contract, and the
town board has yet to decide if a contract with the private prison would
have to be approved by the board or the residents. Those involved, however,
insist there is progress but won't elaborate.
July 22, 2006 Greeley Tribune
It may be a month or more before residents know if the town of Ault
will be home to a 1,500-bed private prison. Ault Mayor James Fladung said
the town board has not decided if it will sign a binding contract with Geo
Group Inc. or if it will allow Ault residents to vote on the proposed
medium-security prison for men. Colorado's Department of Corrections
recently granted Geo the rights to build a prison in Ault in the next two
years. But Geo cannot actually build the facility until it gets approval
from the town. The board is negotiating with Geo over prices and fees on
issues such as water and sewer. A final contract for the prison still needs
to be written. "There is quite a bit of distance to cover yet,"
said Sharon Sullivan, Ault town clerk and treasurer. "It will continue
to be ongoing, but there is a long way to go." Fladung said it could
possibly be a month before any decision is made. The town board has the
authority to approve a contract without a vote from Ault residents because
the land where the prison would be located is zoned industrial, Fladung
said. But the mayor said that because of public sentiment the board will
consider conducting a poll or even allow a public vote on the issue. Nearly
300 people attended a public hearing last Tuesday. The majority of those
people opposed the prison. Fladung said he thought it would be good to hold
more public hearings before any contract is signed. "We must listen to
the people. They were the ones who elected us," Fladung said. In late
June the town board unanimously passed a resolution approving the concept
of a private prison in Ault. Sullivan said that resolution confused many
people and led them to believe that the town board already signed a
contract with Geo. The logistics and time frame of a contract still aren't
clear, but Fladung said he can guarantee that the contract will not raise
any taxes or utility fees for Ault residents. "I'm standing pretty
solid about the people in Ault not paying them a penny more for them to
come in," Fladung said.
July 19, 2006 Greeley Tribune
Debate over whether to allow a men's medium security prison to be built in
Ault has divided the normally quiet community. Almost 300 Ault residents
overwhelmed Tuesday night's town board meeting to discuss the pros and cons
of allowing the Florida-based company Geo Group Inc. to build a 1,500 bed
private prison in Ault. So many people showed up that the meeting had to be
delayed half an hour to move the meeting to the larger VFW building. The
issue pitted neighbor against neighbor with strong opinions and statements
made by nearly 50 people on both sides of the issue. "Geo is like
Wal-Mart. They could care less about this town," said John Jablonski
of Ault. "They want to use us to make money." The majority of the
crowd was strongly against the prison but faced opposition from a vocal
minority of Ault's business owners. They believe the prison will be the
economic boost Ault's dwindling economy needs to survive. Sheila Kelsey,
owner of the House of Bargains, has lived in Ault for 34 years and said
that during all that time little economic growth has occurred. "The
prison would be in my front yard, but we desperately need the
business," Kelsey said. "If we do not get this business, this
town will die. It will be a ghost town." Many of those against the
prison did not like its close proximity to town and called it a safety
hazard, a drain on resources such as water and an overall detriment to the
well-being of Ault. Amber Kauffman, who has lived in the town for five years,
said she is all for growth but not at the expense of having to live near a
prison. "We came here to live in a small town and a small
community," Kauffman said. "A prison would change the dynamics of
this town." Her husband, Ty Kauffman, said that if the prison does go
in, the company wants to run water and sewer lines across his fields which
would hurt his annual hay crop. Ty Kauffman said that if the prison does
come to Ault, he will be out of town in two weeks. "You do so much to
your home to loose it all," he said. "It's a nightmare." Ken
Fortier, a representative from Geo, said the prison would bring jobs and
purchasing power to Ault. He said that Geo is the largest private
corrections facility company in the world and operates high and medium security
prisons on many continents including the world's largest private prison in
South Africa and a facility that is part of the Guantanamo Bay complex in
Cuba. "Step away from the emotions to the notion of what economically
300 jobs mean to the town of Ault," Fortier said. There was still a
lot of questions left in the air on Tuesday. Board members did not tell the
crowd when, or if, they would sign a contract with the company.
July 18, 2006 Greeley Tribune
Controversy is brewing in Ault about the proposed men's prison expected
to be built southeast of town by the Florida-based Geo Group Inc. The
Coalition Against the Ault Prison, comprised of 10 residents, will attend
tonight's Ault town board meeting to oppose the 1,500-bed prison. The
residents have passed out fliers and petitions against Colorado's
Department of Corrections late June decision to grant Geo the rights to
construct the prison there in the next two years. If the town board signs a
contract with the Geo Group, the number of prisoners would more than double
this town of roughly 1,400 people. Tasha Greene, 35, an environmental
health and safety officer in Ault began the opposition group about a week
ago and said the members extensively researched the economic and social
impacts a prison might have on a small town. Greene said she collected 117
signatures of registered Ault voters who are opposed to the prison.
"There are a few people we talked to that want this prison 100
percent, but the fast majority are dead set against it," Greene said.
Though Ault residents have an hour to present comments at tonight's
meeting, Greene said she is unsure if the board will take her group's
concerns to heart. "We get a sense that they will do what they want to
do," Greene said. "Who cares about public opinion?" The
board in May passed a resolution agreeing with the prison in concept. The
resolution states that prior to the board executing a contract or any
financing agreements with the Geo Group, "the final forms of such
documents and/or agreement shall be submitted for approval to the town, and
if satisfactory to the town, their execution shall be authorized by
resolution or ordinance ..." If the board ignores their concerns,
Greene said she plans to pursue formal legal action against the prison's
construction. Larry Hosier, another member of the coalition, said he thinks
the town board is completely out of touch with the people of Ault and not
smart enough to properly negotiate with Geo's high-powered executives.
"They don't even know the right questions to ask," Hosier said.
The group is concerned the prison will make the town unsafe, overtax the
already low water supply in the area, create light and air pollution, lower
property values, create a higher unemployment rate, bankrupt small
businesses and ruin the character and aesthetics of Ault. "Ault will
no longer be 'A Unique Little Town," one of the coalition's flyer's
proclaims. "Once a prison town always a prison town." Some
residents are so concerned about the negative effects they claim they will
actually move out of Ault. "I had one guy sign the petition. The next
day his home went up for sale," Hosier said, adding that and his wife
may consider doing the same after living in town for more than 30 years.
Greene is equally convinced that Ault isn't big enough for both her and the
prison, and said she would find a new home for her nine horses. She said
she is most concerned about safety and the possibility that escaped
convicts could put the community in danger. "I'd feel I'll need to put
up really tall fences and buy really big dogs and make myself a private
arsenal," Greene said.
Aurora INS
Detention Facility
Aurora, Colorado
GEO Group (formerly known as Wackenhut Corrections)
Feb 23, 2022
coloradosun.com
"It's like they don't believe in
COVID-19": Complaint claims ICE failing to contain infections at
Aurora facility Poor health standards resulted in a coronavirus outbreak
inside the immigration detention facility run by the private, for-profit
GEO Group, advocacy group says.
A national immigrant advocacy group has filed a
complaint with the U.S.
Department of Homeland Security over a COVID
outbreak at the immigration detention facility in Aurora. The complaint, filed
by the American Immigration Council, alleges that Immigrations and Customs
Enforcement's official tally of active COVID cases within the facility -
which hit 138 on Feb. 7 - is an undercount because the facility is not
conducting adequate testing. There were 68 active cases within the facility
on Feb. 15, the most recent official account reported by the Vera Institute
of Justice. The facility has an average daily population of about 550.
According to the complaint, the facility has not provided sufficient
opportunities for vaccination, is not enforcing mask rules for staff, is
not providing enough cleaning supplies and is neglecting the medical needs
of those who are detained. Detainees who want to speak out against the
issues fear reprisal, the complaint states. The complaint asks for improved
conditions within the facility and for more detainees to be released from
custody while their immigration cases are pending. "People should be
able to pursue their claims to immigration relief without putting their
physical and mental health at risk," the complaint states. The Aurora
facility, which is owned by the private, for-profit prison company GEO
Group, has been at the center of controversy before for its handling of the
pandemic during previous waves of infection. The complaint, which was filed
in partnership with the locally based Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy
Network, alleges that little has changed. RMIAN provides free attorneys and
legal services to adults and children in immigration detention in Colorado,
including those at the Aurora facility. "Access to medical care is a
human right," Colleen Cowgill, a RMIAN pro bono coordinating attorney,
said in a statement. "ICE cannot continue to detain people while
failing to provide for their health and safety. We are two years into the
pandemic and ICE has shown that it cannot protect those in its care."
In a statement to The Colorado Sun, ICE said the agency follows U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance in its facilities and
has vaccinated nearly 50,000 of its detainees nationwide. The agency says
it has translated vaccine informational materials into multiple languages
for its detainees and provides appropriate medical care for detainees who
do fall sick. As of late January, the agency had given monoclonal antibody
or antiviral treatments to 89 detainees nationwide with COVID. "ICE is
focused on delivering high-quality, evidence-based medical care and will
continue to ensure detained individuals receive care with dignity and
respect," the statement read. Affidavits filed by detainees included
in the complaint state that medical isolation cells at the Aurora facility
for detainees who contract COVID are dirty and testing is minimal. One
detainee, identified in the complaint by the pseudonym Leticia, said she
was left in the general population for several days even after her roommate
tested positive for COVID and she felt sick herself. "Although people
are often sick, I only see people getting tested for COVID-19 when they are
getting ready to fly to be deported," she said in her affidavit. When
she finally received a test - which came back positive - Leticia said she
was moved to a "suicide watch room," where she was initially
denied a television and also was not provided with craft supplies she had
requested to pass the time. "There was a really bad smell in the
suicide room because of an issue with the sewer pipes in the room,"
Leticia said in her affidavit. "Medical staff told me they had put in
service orders, but nothing had been done." Detainees also allege that
guards seldom provide masks to detainees or wear them properly themselves,
despite rules requiring them to do both. "If I asked an officer to get
me a mask, they would not because they do not have them or they don't want
to," one detainee, identified in the complaint by the pseudonym Musa,
stated in an affidavit. "It's like they do not care. It's like they
don't believe in COVID-19." Staffers for U.S. Rep. Jason Crow, an
Aurora Democrat whose district includes the Aurora facility, have been
conducting weekly monitoring of the facility since early in the pandemic.
His office's most recent report, dated Feb. 9, found that 140 of the 497
people housed at the facility on that date - 28% - were being
"cohorted" due to sickness. The term refers to the practice of
isolating groups of people in order to contain the spread of the virus. The
report also stated that 910 people housed at the facility have tested
positive for COVID since March 30, 2020 - a number that includes both ICE
detainees and people held there by the U.S. Marshals Service. There have
been 218 positive cases among ICE and GEO Group employees working at the
facility. The complaint echoes concerns he has long raised about the Aurora
detention facility, Crow said in a statement. "The allegations
outlined in this report are serious and highlight the ongoing need for
oversight of these private, for-profit facilities," Crow said. "I
remain committed to holding this facility accountable and increasing
transparency."
Jun
7, 2019 westword.com
Report: Aurora Immigrant Detention Facility Violates Multiple ICE
Standards
According to a new federal government report, the immigration detention
facility in Aurora violates multiple government detention standards.
"This report by the Department of Homeland Security Inspector General
confirms what we have been hearing for quite some time: that detainees at
ICE's Aurora facility are not being properly cared for," Congresswoman
Diana DeGette said in a statement. Congressman Jason Crow, whose district
includes Aurora, referred to the report as "deeply disturbing" in
a written statement. On June 3, the Office of Inspector General at the Department
of Homeland Security published its analysis of four detention centers that
house detainees in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody, including
the facility in Aurora (the other three are located in Louisiana,
California and New Jersey). The report found that the Aurora facility,
which is run by private prison company GEO Group through a contract with
ICE, violates ICE standards for outdoor recreation, in-person visitations
and restraining detainees in solitary confinement. The authors of the
report investigated the facilities "in response to concerns raised by
immigrant rights groups and complaints to the Office of Inspector General
(OIG) Hotline about conditions for detainees held in U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody." Before the investigators visited
the Aurora facility, staff used handcuffs on detainees in solitary
confinement when they were outside their cells. However, according to the
report, that protocol didn't comply with ICE standards, since
"placement in disciplinary segregation alone does not constitute a
valid basis for using restraints." According to ICE, security staff at
the Aurora facility have since received "refresher training"
about when to use handcuffs for detainees in solitary confinement, and a
security officer will now ensure that staffers comply with the protocol by
reviewing security footage daily. The report notes that the Aurora facility
does not provide a true outdoor recreation space for detainees, which
"may reduce detainee mental health and welfare." Detainees have
daily access to a recreation center inside the facility that has an
open-air, albeit caged, roof. Investigators interviewed detainees at the
Aurora facility who said they wanted "true outdoor recreation for the
fresh air, sunshine and exercise, and for playing soccer with their fellow
detainees." ICE argues that the recreation space in the Aurora
facility fully complies with — and actually far exceeds — government
standards. At the time of the inspection, the Aurora facility did not allow
in-person visits for detainees, which the federal government recommends
would help with morale. Noting that in-person visits are only recommended
and not required (except for lawyers), ICE says that staff at the facility
will now review requests for in-person visits on a case-by-case basis. The
report comes nearly a year after ICE finished its own investigation into a
December 2017 death at the Aurora facility that found staffers largely
mishandled the care of Kamyar Samimi, who died after being in custody for
about two weeks. And as of June 4, 152 detainees at the Aurora facility
were under quarantine because of cases of mumps and chicken pox. "The
report points to the fact that this is an extremely oppressive, punitive
environment, where it may take a real toll on an individual detainee’s
mental health," says Liz Jordan, an attorney who advocates on behalf
of detainees through the Civil Rights Education and Enforcement Center.
Feb 1, 2019 westword.com
There's Been Another Chicken Pox Outbreak at Immigrant Detention
Facility
There has been another chicken pox outbreak at the immigrant detention
center in Aurora, the second in just three months. A detainee
"pod," which is a prison housing unit consisting of individual
cells, was quarantined for weeks after an outbreak in October. Now two pods
have been quarantined for 21 days because of the virus, said GEO Group
spokesman Pablo Paez in an email. Paez did not answer additional questions
about why a second outbreak had occurred, or what the facility, which is
managed by private-prison company GEO Group through a contract with
Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was doing to prevent future outbreaks.
But today, January 31, I met a detainee at the facility who described what
it was like being under quarantine during last fall's outbreak. From behind
a glass partition in the center's visitor room, Miguel Angel, 34, described
how guards one day told his pod, which housed 77 detainees, that they
couldn't leave their housing unit, offering no explanation. “We had no idea
what was going on,” Angel recalls. "Guards just told us that we had to
wait.” They wound up waiting for a few days, during which they couldn't
access the recreation yard, see visitors, consult face-to-face with
lawyers, or even attend their immigration hearings. About a week in, the
detainees finally learned that they were under a medical quarantine because
of a possible chicken pox outbreak, Angel says. The potentially sick
individuals had been removed from the housing unit before it was locked
down. And weeks into the quarantine, a doctor still had not visited the
pod. Exasperated, Angel and about sixty other detainees wrote letters to
ICE and the GEO Group demanding answers — and to see a doctor. Here's the
letter: It has been two weeks now that we have been in quarantine and not
one doctor has been sent to this pod to offer medical treatment for the
chicken pox. The first three people that were infected have been treated,
cured and were switched over to a different pod, and are now living their
normal process. But we have no visits, deportations, and our court
[hearings] are being delayed. They won't exchange our blankets, give
haircuts, and we are prohibited from having rec time in the yard. We are
being exposed to dangerous medical conditions living like this, causing
depression, anxiety, high blood pressure, and conditions that could be
fatal. The most difficult part is the court dates being rescheduled. Many
of us have already had chicken pox or been vaccinated. Our immigration
process is being delayed because this outbreak wasn't properly handled from
the start, and it's not fair. It feels like medical resources don't want to
be used on us because we don't deserve it. We are all in desperate need of
help. Meanwhile, he saw firsthand how the lock-down put some detainees at
greater medical risk since they didn't have regular access to a medical
staff. One young man, who was complaining of a fever and had lost his
appetite, asked guards to take him to a doctor. The guards stuck the man in
his cell, believing that he had chicken pox, according to Angel. But then
he collapsed, and guards had to rush in and do CPR to resuscitate him.
"His heart had stopped briefly," Angel claims. After CPR, the man
was transferred out of the pod, Angel remembers. Either that episode or the
letters finally got GEO Group's attention. A doctor finally visited the
pod, dressed in a full-body hazmat suit “looking like an astronaut,” says
Angel. Some of the information that Angel provided about October's outbreak
(at least the number of individuals who were quarantined) runs counter to
what ICE had told media outlets, including Westword, at the time. “Of the
77 detainees who were tested, medical staff diagnosed three detainees with
varicella; seven others had low immunity and therefore possessed increased
risk factors of contracting the disease; all ten were quarantined at the
facility,” spokesman Carl Rusnok said in a statement. “The Aurora medical
staff continues to provide high-level care to all those affected, while at
the same time continuing to serve the medical needs of the entire facility
population.” Multiple requests for comment sent to ICE about the second
outbreak haven't been returned; if and when they are, we'll update this
story. Angel says he feels for fellow detainees who are locked up in the
two affected pods. Asked why he believes this has happened a second time,
he says, “it's because our lives don't matter to them. We could die in here
and there's nothing we can do."
Dec 21, 2017 westword.com
ACLU Investigating Death of Iranian Immigrant at Aurora Detention
Facility
Earlier this morning, the ACLU of Colorado announced that it filed a
Freedom of Information Act request to obtain more information about how a
64-year-old Iranian man, Kamyar Samimi, died while being held at the
Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Aurora on December
2. ICE issued a statement two days after Samimi died, saying that the
primary cause of death was cardiac arrest and that Samimi had been
transferred to the University of Colorado Medical Center on the morning of
December 2 before he was pronounced dead shortly after 12 p.m. The ACLU of
Colorado wants to know exactly what happened. “Once again, a death in ICE
custody raises serious questions about whether the agency is continuing to
fail in its legal duty to provide necessary and adequate medical care to
detainees in its custody,” says Mark Silverstein, legal director for the
ACLU of Colorado. In 2012, a 46-year-old named Evalin-Ali Mandza died of
cardiac arrest at the same detention center. An investigation of that death
showed that staff at the GEO Group-run facility did not know how to
properly use an EKG machine and stalled in calling an ambulance. The GEO
Group manages private prisons across the U.S. and contracts with ICE to manage
immigrant-detention facilities. The ACLU has looked into deaths at
immigrant-detention facilities nationwide and co-authored a report in 2016
called "Fatal Neglect: How ICE Ignored Deaths in Detention."
Nearly 200 immigrant detainees have died while in custody in ICE facilities
since 2003. Samimi, who came to the United States as a student in 1976 and
was arrested at his home on November 17 by ICE (the agency says he had a
minor drug conviction from 2005), is the latest detainee to die in
Colorado. “Mr. Samimi’s arrest, detention and death in custody display the
inhumanity of our current federal immigration policies,” says ACLU of
Colorado staff attorney Arash Jahanian. “He lived in the U.S. for forty
years. ICE arrested him at his home with the intent to ship him off to a
country he no longer knew. Then they locked him up in a detention facility,
where he died two weeks later. ICE gave very little detail about what
happened but made sure to mention his twelve-year-old drug-possession
charge. The community deserves better, and that starts with ICE explaining
what led to Mr. Samimi’s tragic death.” Silverstein characterizes ICE's
detention facilities as "cloaked in secrecy." "[They] offer
little to no transparency into the way detainees are treated within their
walls,” the legal director says. "We are invoking the Freedom of
Information Act to further the public’s right to know what goes on in these
secretive taxpayer-funded institutions.” Meanwhile, a class action lawsuit
is being tried in federal court over alleged forced labor practices at the
Aurora facility. In September, the ACLU of Colorado found that clients of
Iraqi descent being held at the facility were being harassed by guards and
pressured to self-deport. A GEO Group spokesman told Westword at the time:
"The Aurora, Colorado, facility has a longstanding record of providing
highly rated services in a safe, secure and humane residential environment
while treating all those entrusted to our care with the respect and dignity
they deserve."
Sep 6, 2017 miaminewtimes.com
ACLU Says South Florida Private Prison Giant Is Torturing Immigration
Detainees
Boca Raton's GEO Group is one of the most powerful private-prison
companies in America — and a major player in state and federal politics.
GEO throws campaign money at Florida lawmakers from both parties: Sens.
Marco Rubio and Bill Nelson, Gov. Rick Scott, Reps. Carlos Curbelo and
Mario Diaz-Balart, and the majority of the Florida Legislature have taken
thousands from GEO despite constant complaints from progressives and
human-rights activists who say the company profits from destroying the
lives of others. Well, here's yet another reason Florida politicians should
drop GEO Group like the plague: The American Civil Liberties Union said
Friday that the company is torturing whistleblowers at its private
immigration detention facility in Aurora, Colorado. GEO runs the facility
on behalf of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. According to the
ACLU, ICE agents at GEO's 1,500-bed Colorado detention center are retaliating
against Iraqi nationals who have joined an ACLU class-action lawsuit to
stop the U.S. from deporting them. The ACLU says employees at the GEO
facility are denying Iraqis food, water, and access to the restroom to
intentionally make their lives a living hell. "GEO, the second largest
immigration detention facility in the country, is a tightly regulated,
colorless institution with bare cement walls, large metal doors that lock
at every threshold, and scores of prisoners in scrubs," the ACLU
writes. "Each of the detainees we interviewed provided accounts of
mistreatment. These accounts were consistent, as was their palpable fear of
death if ultimately deported to Iraq." The ACLU writes today that the
Trump administration agreed to take Iraq off its list of countries covered
under the so-called Muslim ban if Iraq agreed to accept ICE deportees. The
ACLU has since sued, but the organization now says ICE agents at the GEO
facility are trying to make detainees miserable so they choose to get
deported. The ACLU writes: Since the court’s ruling, ICE appears to have
ramped up its efforts to make the lives of Iraqis in custody so unbearable
that they will “voluntarily” sign away their rights to reopen their
immigration cases or pursue asylum. The Iraqis have been singled out and
denied food, water, and access to the restroom. One man, who came to the
United States as a refugee in 1976, reflected that if he goes back to Iraq,
he will be tortured and killed. Still, he feels that his experiences at the
hands of ICE are “a different way of torture.” He has told his wife that he
is considering just signing the form and going back to Iraq. In Arizona and
Colorado, and on the plane traveling between the two locations, ICE guards
referred to the Iraqis as “camel jockey,” “rag head,” and “terrorist.”
Guards at GEO referred to one of our clients as ‘Al Qaeda’ and told him,
“You Iraqis are the worst people in here. We can’t stand you Iraqis.” When
he tried to say that he has rights, he was told that he doesn’t have any rights
because he was “an alien.” ICE guards in Arizona and Colorado have openly
pressured Iraqi nationals to sign away their right to fight their
immigration cases. Some guards told the detainees that their situations
were hopeless and urged them to sign forms agreeing to voluntary
deportation, without counsel present. Some Iraqis apparently succumbed to
the pressure. The brave men we spoke to have decided to stay and fight.
Miami New Times' sister newspaper Phoenix New Times has covered the plight
of Iraqi nationals trapped in an Arizona detention center run by CoreCivic
(formerly known as the Corrections Corporation of America), GEO Group's
main competitor. In July, an Arizona judge blocked the deportation of 1,400
Iraqi Chaldean Catholics on the grounds they could be tortured for their
religious beliefs and ties to the United States. In 2013, the Huffington
Post reported that the CCA/CoreCivic's lobbying firms have donated more
than $20,000 to South Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. In 2011,
Wasserman Schultz threw her support behind a plan to build a private,
CCA-run immigration facility in South Florida. That decision sparked
protests and has cast a shadow over her recent bids for reelection. But of
the two companies, it's Boca's GEO Group that remains the major political
power in Florida. According to the National Institute on Money in State
Politics (NIMSP), GEO has given $7.8 million to 885 candidates across the
nation over the past 17 years. The group rains money in Florida: It is
honestly difficult to find a state politician who has not taken at least a
tiny amount of money from the company in that time period. According to
NIMSP records, the group has sent checks to the majority of the state
Legislature in Tallahassee, Rubio has taken $30,500 from GEO, Curbelo has
received $11,000, and Nelson has accepted $5,000. Other recipients include
U.S. Reps. Ted Deutch, Frederica Wilson, Mario Diaz-Balart, Charlie Crist,
and Governor Scott. GEO is still donating today: The group gave former
state Rep. Jose Feliz "Pepi" Diaz $3,000 in his current race for
the state Senate seat vacated by N-word-dropping ex-lawmaker Frank Artiles.
Last year, the Miami Herald reported that GEO absolutely vomited cash at
state Senate President Joe Negron and his wife Rebecca, who ran for the GOP
nomination for Senate last year before Rubio announced his plans to run for
reelection. The Herald reported that GEO gave the couple a combined
$288,000 in a single election cycle. "It is tragic that these
individuals, who fear persecution in Iraq because of their religion and
connection to America, are now being persecuted by agents of the United
States government," the ACLU wrote last week.
Aug 18, 2017
nationallawjournal
Advocacy Groups Side With Plaintiffs Alleging Unpaid Labor At For-Profit
Prison
Advocacy groups have weighed in on a lawsuit against the nation's
second-largest for-profit prison provider, arguing in recently filed
"friend-of-the-court briefs" that GEO Group Inc.'s alleged
practices of relying on cheap and unpaid labor by detained immigrants
underscores abuses to this vulnerable community. Attorneys who filed the
lawsuit in 2014 are currently fighting to uphold class certification in the
case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. The U.S.
District Court for the District of Colorado in Denver originally certified
the class, which could include as many as 60,000 detainees who cycled in
and out of the GEO Group-owned Aurora Processing Detention Center in since
2004. Over the last week, a slew of advocacy organizations, including The
Southern Poverty Law Center, Public Citizen and a group of national
immigrant rights groups, filed briefs that point to the broader
implications of the case — noting issues around human trafficking and the
for-profit prison industry. They also discussed the importance of class
actions for vulnerable immigrant groups. This potential class action
against GEO, a Republican campaign donor, comes at a time when the $3
billion for-profit prison industry is gaining support from the Trump administration.
Earlier this year, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions rescinded guidance
from the Obama administration that would have reduced the construction of
privately owned prisons. A separate complaint has also been filed at the
Federal Election Commission by the Campaign Legal Center against GEO,
claiming the company illegally contributed $225,000 to a pro-Trump PAC
during the 2016 election. And according to reports, the U.S. Department of
Justice under President Donald Trump has awarded the GEO Group more federal
contracts for private prison facilities. "This is about the excesses
of the private prison system and how it almost invariably led to forced
labor and human trafficking," said David Lopez of Outten & Golden,
who represents the plaintiffs in the Aurora case. "This case
illustrates why it's dangerous and they have a built-in system to keep the
costs down. Absent of such class actions, who will hold them
accountable?" Outten & Golden attorneys this year joined
Nashville-based immigration attorney Andrew Free, attorneys for
Denver-based advocacy group Towards Justice and Colorado-based attorneys
for Milstein Law Office and Meyers Law Office in bringing the suit. The
lawsuit claims that GEO amassed enormous profits through "forced labor"
provided to the Aurora prison through a contract with U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement. The suit takes aim at the company's "sanitation
policy" that required ICE detainees to work as janitors without pay
under the threat of solitary confinement. It also targets a "voluntary
work program" that allegedly paid detainees only $1 a day. Two classes
were certified by the Denver federal court that could include between
40,000 to 60,000 laborers that were detained in Aurora over the last 10
years. The private prison system, and its profit margin, appears to depend
upon this type of labor, Free said. He said the case in Colorado is a
reflection that such policies and practices affect a wide array of people
in the immigration system. "These policies run directly counter to
protections that people have fought hard to apply to all immigrants and
workers," Free said. "How exactly would these staffing plans work
if companies were not allowed to use free and nearly free labor of
detainees?" In a statement, GEO responded that the volunteer work
program at all of its 143 immigration facilities, as well as the minimum
wage rates and standards, are set by the government. The company also said
that all of its facilities, including the Aurora center, are "highly
rated and provide high-quality services in safe, secure and humane
residential environments pursuant to the federal government's national
standards." "GEO has consistently, strongly refuted the
allegations made in this lawsuit, and we intend to continue to vigorously
defend our company against these claims," the company said in the
statement. The organizations filing briefs supporting plaintiffs in the
suit against GEO, a massive for-profit prison company, include the Southern
Poverty Law Center and the National Employment Law Project.GEO: Facing
legal challenges.
Jul 10, 2015 abcnews.go.com
Lawsuit: Immigrants
Got $1 a Day for Work at Private Prison
Immigrants who were detained at a suburban Denver
facility while they awaited deportation proceedings are suing the private company
that held them, alleging they were paid $1 a day to do janitorial work,
sometimes under threat of solitary confinement. They scrubbed toilets,
mopped and swept floors, did laundry, and prepared and served meals, among
other duties, according to attorneys who filed the lawsuit in October on
behalf of nine current and former detainees. On Monday, U.S. District Court
Judge John L. Kane declined a request from the Florida-based GEO Group Inc.
to dismiss the claims against it, allowing the federal lawsuit to proceed.
GEO is one of the largest contractors with the federal government for the
detention of immigrants suspected of being in the country illegally or
legal permanent residents with criminal records who face deportation. The
company has denied wrongdoing and said in court documents the work is
voluntary and it is abiding by federal guidelines in paying $1 a day.
Attorneys for the immigrants say they'll move to expand the case by seeking
class-action status. They say the judge's ruling clears the way to gather
more information from GEO through discovery proceedings about how many
detainees were put to work. The attorneys said they've heard from clients
for years that immigrants labor for almost nothing at private detention
facilities around the country, but they called the lawsuit filed in
Colorado the first of its kind. "It's their job to run the facility,
and instead they used and abused us to run the facility, and that's why
we're suing," said plaintiff Alejandro Menocal, 53. Menocal is a legal
permanent resident who was detained for three months at GEO's Aurora
facility while facing deportation last fall. GEO responded in a statement
that its facilities "provide high-quality services in safe, secure and
humane residential environments, and our company strongly refutes
allegations to the contrary." The company added attorneys and
immigrant advocates have full access to its facilities that U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement contracts with, and they're routinely
audited and inspected by the government. Anita Sinha, a faculty member at
Washington College of Law, American University who has researched immigrant
labor at private detention centers, said the daily wage was set by Congress
in 1950 and hasn't been adjusted for inflation. She said on a daily basis,
immigrants facing deportation occupy about 34,000 beds nationally in
private and government-run facilities. More than 60 percent of the beds are
in privately held facilities, she said. The company succeeded in getting
the judge to dismiss a claim that it violated Colorado's minimum wage law
because detainees were paid $1 a day instead of $8.23 an hour. In tossing
that claim, Kane said the detainees do not qualify as employees under state
law. But he said the lawsuit could proceed on the allegations that GEO
unjustly profited from the detainees and violated the federal Trafficking
Victims Protection Act, which prohibits forced labor. "Legally, this
is a big step forward," said Hans Meyer, Menocal's attorney. It's
common for inmates at state or privately run prisons to work below minimum
wage, in some cases for the purpose of gaining job training. "The
difference here is that these are civil immigration detainees who are not
being held for any criminal violation," said Brandt Milstein, another
attorney in the lawsuit. Menocal, a Mexican immigrant from Baja California,
was released in September and kept his legal resident status after his
attorney won his case. He said he faced deportation proceedings last year
when authorities learned after a traffic stop that he had a criminal record
from 2010 for driving with a suspended license and having his wife's
prescription painkillers in his car. He pleaded guilty and served a year of
probation soon after, but he didn't come to the attention of immigration
authorities at the time. The lawsuit focuses only on the GEO's suburban
Denver facilities, but the American Civil Liberties Union said the claims
are similar to allegations they've heard around the country. "There is
a name for locking people up and forcing them to do work without paying
real wages. It's called slavery," said Carl Takei, staff attorney at
the national prison project of the ACLU. The monetary amount the lawsuit
seeks hasn't been determined.
Jul 9, 2015
westword.com
GEO LAWSUIT ALLEGING FORCED LABOR OF IMMIGRANT DETAINEES MOVES FORWARD
Update below: In a move that could have
resounding consequences for corrections practices and the for-profit prison
industry in particular, a Denver federal judge has refused to dismiss a
lawsuit filed by nine federal immigrant detainees, who allege that a
private prison contractor forced them to perform maintenance and cleaning
jobs for little or no pay. The suit, which is seeking class-action status,
accuses the company of violating federal laws prohibiting human trafficking
and forced labor and seeks millions of dollars in damages. Senior U.S.
District Judge John L. Kane threw out some of the plaintiffs' claims but
allowed the case against The GEO Group, which operates a detention facility
in Aurora under contract with U.S. Immigrant and Customs Enforcement (ICE),
to move forward. The decision was hailed as "a tremendous victory for
civil immigrant detainees nationwide" by Nina DiSalvo, the executive
director of Towards Justice, a Denver-based nonprofit that partnered with
several law firms to bring the action. "The judge's decision allows us
to address the systemic problems with GEO's treatment of immigrant workers
throughout the legal system." One of the largest private prison
companies in the world, GEO operates 66 correctional facilities in the
United States, including ICE detention centers in Washington, Florida, and
Colorado. The complaint alleges that Aurora detainees participate in a
"voluntary work program" that includes laundry, kitchen and cleaning
jobs, for which they are paid a dollar a day. Six detainees are also
selected at random each day to clean the living pods without pay; refusal
can result in being placed in solitary confinement. The lawsuit argued that
the arrangement violates Colorado's minimum wage law. Judge Kane disagreed,
since the state's labor laws specifically carve out an exception for
prisoners, who are not considered employees. But Kane found merit in the
claim that GEO's approach to the pod-cleaning assignments — do it or get
thrown in the hole — may be a violation of the federal Trafficking Victims
Protection Act, which prohibits involuntary servitude and coercive methods
to demand work "by means of force, threats of force, physical
restraint, or threats of physical restraint." The judge also allowed a
claim involving unjust enrichment to proceed. Most correctional systems
depend on cheap inmate labor to keep costs down. Kane's denial of GEO's
motion to dismiss doesn't signal an end to that practice. It does, however,
raise questions about the ability of a private contractor to demand that
inmates perform basic maintenance or cleaning tasks under threat of further
punishment. "Using forced detainee labor is an integral tool in
maintaining GEO's profitability under its contracts with ICE,"
Nashville attorney Andrew Free, a co-counsel in the case, noted in prepared
statement. "The court's decision today represents an important step
forward in ending that morally bankrupt business model." GEO has not
responded to a request for comment on the ruling. We'll update this post if
a response is forthcoming. Update,
1:00 p.m.: The GEO Group corporate headquarters has provided a statement in
response to our request for comment that reads, in part: "GEO’s facilities,
including the Aurora, Colo., facility, provide high quality services in
safe, secure, and humane residential environments, and our company strongly
refutes allegations to the contrary. The volunteer work program at
immigration facilities as well as the wage rates and standards associated with
the program are set by the federal government. Our facilities adhere to
these standards as well as strict contractual requirements and all
standards set by ICE, and the agency employs several full-time, on-site
contract monitors who have a physical presence at each of GEO’s
facilities."
Oct 23, 2014 stateswithoutnations.blogspot.com
GEO Sued for
Minimum Wage and Forced Labor Law Violations, and Unjust Enrichment
Yesterday, Alejandro
Menoca, Marcos Brambila, Grisel Xahuentitla, Hugo Hernandez, Lourdes, Argueta,
Jesus Gaytan, Olga Alexaklina, Dagaberto Vizguerra, and Demetrio Valerga on
their own behalf and others similarly situated filed a complaint informing
a federal judge that their guards were breaking the law. The complaint, filed by an
intrepid team of lawyers who spent extensive time interviewing detainees at
the GEO facility in Aurora, Colorado, states: In the course of their
employment by GEO, Plaintiffs and others scrubbed bathrooms, showers,
toilets, and windows throughout GEO’s Aurora facility. They cleaned and
maintained GEO’s on-site medical facility, cleaned the medical facility’s
toilets, floors and windows, cleaned patient rooms and medical staff
offices, swept, mopped, stripped, and waxed the floors of the medical
facility, did medical facility laundry, swept, mopped, stripped, and waxed
floors throughout the facility, did detainee laundry, prepared and served
detainee meals, assisted in preparing catered meals for law enforcement
events sponsored by GEO, performed clerical work for GEO, prepared clothing
for newly arriving detainees, provided barber services to detainees, ran
the facility’s law library, cleaned the facility’s intake area and solitary
confinement unit, deep cleaned and prepared vacant portions of the facility
for newly arriving detainees, cleaned the facility’s warehouse, and
maintained the exterior and landscaping of the GEO building, inter alia.
The complaint also includes violations of a federal law prohibiting Forced
Labor, 18 U.S.C. § 1589: 5. GEO or its agents also randomly selected
six detainees per pod each day and forced them to clean the pods. In the
handbook that GEO distributed to the detainees, GEO announced a “Housing
Unit Sanitation” policy informing the people held at the facility that
“[e]ach and every detainee must participate in the facility’s sanitation
program.” 6. GEO or its agents forced Plaintiffs and other civil
immigration detainees to clean the facility’s pods for no pay and under
threat of solitary confinement as punishment for any refusal to work. And
the complaint references Colorado Common Law prohibiting Unjust
Enrichment. In precise and riveting language the 21 page brief
brilliantly lays out the legal problems with the private prison industry's
business model. The attorneys who filed this lawsuit are Brandt Milstein,
Boulder, CO; Andrew Turner, Denver, CO; Alexander Hood, Golden, CO; Hans
Meyer, Denver, CO; and Andrew Free, Nashville, TN. I have been filing FOIA
requests on this topic for several years and Andrew Free is currently
representing me in extricating additional material for use in a working
paper that will be revised for publication next year in the Georgetown
Immigration Law Journal. For more research on related violations,
please go here.
February 16, 2009 The Aurora
Sentinel
About 50 people from various advocacy groups gathered near an Aurora
detention facility Monday, Feb. 16, to rally for changes to the nation’s
immigration policies and an end to raids on suspected illegal immigrants.
The vigil, which was organized by local clergy, was one of more than 100
actions across the country aimed at “demonstrating the faith communities’
commitment to inject humanity and compassion into the public dialogue on
immigration,” organizers said in a statement. Jennifer Piper, of the Quaker
organization American Friends Service Committee, said ending raids was one
of the main goals of the vigil. “These raids really tear families and
workers out of our community,” Piper said. The vigil brought out a diverse
crowd with participants ranging from toddlers to senior citizens. The group
clutched candles, said prayers and spoke about their concerns. “All faith
traditions share a common mandate to welcome and care for all members of
our community and love our neighbors as ourselves,” Jeremy Shaver, executive
director of the Interfaith Alliance of Colorado, said in a statement. “As
people of faith, we must keep that in the forefront of our minds as we
approach the complex issue of immigration.” Organizers said recent
immigration raids have been destructive for immigrants’ families and they
hope the vigils lead to change in Washington. “We call on President Obama
and members of Congress to demonstrate the courage to pass immigration
policies that uphold and protect the dignity and human rights of all,” Shaver
said. The vigil was held just a few blocks from a privately owned and
operated detention facility that houses suspected illegal immigrants.
Florida-based GEO Group, which owns the facility, has plans to expand it —
a proposal that has come under fire from immigrant groups.
January 8, 2008 Colorado
Confidential
A former corrections employee is suing prison contractor The GEO Group,
operator of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention
facility in Aurora. In a suit filed in Denver District Court, former GEO
employee Celia Ramirez alleges the company failed to follow its own
anti-discrimination policies. According to the suit, filed in December,
Ramirez was employed by GEO as a detention officer at the Aurora ICE lockup
for just over two years before being fired for failing to return lockup
keys to their designated area. However, in the suit Ramirez contends that
another GEO worker, Jennifer Beauman, took the keys and placed them on the
facility's roof to retaliate against the plaintiff for reporting the
employee for inappropriate conduct. According to the suit, Beauman is
reported to have engaged in erratic behavior, such as angrily slamming
doors and flicking lights on and off in the presence of inmates. Attempts
to reach Beauman were unsuccessful. The suit alleges Beauman
"joked" about taking the keys to get back at Ramirez, before the
keys went missing. A maintenance worker is reported to have later found the
keys on the facility's rooftop. The crux of the lawsuit contends that
Ramirez was discriminated against for her gender and Latino ethnicity, and
that GEO failed to enforce written policies of barring gender or race
discrimination as stipulated in the company's employee handbook. Pablo
Paez, a spokesman for the GEO Group, said that it is the company's
corporate policy not to discuss pending litigation. Lisa Sahli, the
attorney who filed the suit, said that Ramirez had obtained another
attorney and that she could not speak further on the case because she is no
longer Ramirez's legal counsel. Attempts to contact Ramirez were also
unsuccessful. The suit comes as GEO is set to expand its Aurora ICE
facility by more than 1000 beds, tripling the current threshold of 400
beds. Ramirez is seeking to bring the case to a jury, according to court
documents.
December 19, 2007 Denver Post
A private company operating the Colorado immigration detention center in
Aurora plans to sink $72 million into an expansion that will more than
triple the size of the facility based on Senate proposals to expand border
enforcement and bed space for illegal-immigrant detainees. The expansion
would turn the 400-bed facility into a 1,500-bed center, making it second
in size only to the 2,000-bed Raymondville, Texas, site, according to U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Aurora site is in a warehouse area
near East 30th Avenue and Peoria Street. The plan by Florida-based GEO
Group, which owns and operates the facility, has raised concerns among
national and local immigrant- and civil-rights groups and the neighborhood
associations in the area. The expansion is expected to be complete in late
2009. A company spokesman did not return numerous calls, but GEO chairman
and chief executive George Zoley detailed the plan recently in a call with
analysts. GEO estimates the 1,100 new beds will raise an additional $30
million in annual revenue, Zoley said during the call. Opponents of the
plan say their concerns are based partly on the lack of access to internal
audits of the facility and recent government reviews showing inadequacies.
"One of the major issues is that GEO has a really spotty record in
running these sorts of facilities," said Chandra Russo, a community
organizer for the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition. "Our concern
with a private corporation running a prison is that its profits depend on
more prisoners. What is the benefit for the community?" Neighbors are
also worried about real estate values and environmental impact. ICE denies
any connection with the expansion the private company is planning with its own
money, said ICE spokesman Carl Rusnok. Currently, the ICE contract for the
Aurora facility is for 400 beds, but the deal is up for review each year
for the next four years. "If they expand the facility, unless they
modify the contract, there is nothing to say those additional beds would be
used or contracted by ICE," Rusnok said. Still, national and local
immigrant groups are concerned about the expansion at the facility, where
they say reports and audits have been slow or not publicly released. Several
years ago, the National Immigration Law Center asked the courts to demand
that ICE release internal reviews of contract facilities and won. But ICE
has been lax in providing the most recent two years' worth of reviews, said
Karen Tumlin, attorney with NILC. "Until ICE is willing to release all
of the reviews, we don't want to see these levels of expansion," she
said. In July, the Government Accountability Office found problems at
several of the detention centers from May 2006 to May 2007. The GAO did not
find extreme cases but noted issues at 16 of 17 ICE centers with phone
calls to pro bono legal help. In Aurora, the report also found that hold
rooms exceeded capacity and log books were not maintained to show how long
people were in rooms or when they had their last meal. In October 2006,
reviews found the Aurora site in violation for lack of cleanliness in food
service. The report also said the center had portable beds in aisles
because of overcrowding. Rusnok said many of the problems identified by the
GAO have since been rectified and that ICE has no plans based on the Senate
proposal. Zoley, during the call, cited a proposed bill, which provides for
additional funding to increase border-patrol agents and increase detention
bed space by more than 5,000 beds. "We believe that this increase in
bed funding will result in additional opportunities for the private
sector," he said. The Department of Homeland Security expects the
undocumented population, estimated to be around 12 million, to grow by 400,000
annually. The total number of illegal immigrants in administrative
proceedings who spend some time in detention annually increased from 95,702
in 2001 to 283,115 in 2006. Detention bed space increased from 19,702 in
2001 to 27,500 last year. After the first of the year, NILC plans to ask
for a moratorium on expansions of these types of facilities until ICE can
ensure minimum compliance with its standards, Tumlin said.
July 11, 2007 Government Executive
Magazine
In a recent review of federal facilities used to detain suspected illegal
immigrants, the Government Accountability Office found a lack of telephone
access to be a pervasive problem, potentially preventing detainees from
contacting legal counsel, their countries' consulates or complaint
hotlines. The GAO review included visits to 23 detention centers housing
immigrants awaiting adjudication or deportation. The watchdog agency
observed the centers -- run by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement
agency within the Homeland Security Department -- for compliance with
nonbinding national detention standards. Of the 23 facilities GAO reviewed,
17 had telephone systems allowing detainees to make free phone calls
seeking assistance. In 16 of these 17 facilities, however, GAO found
systemic problems hindering phone access. Issues ranged from inaccurate or
outdated numbers posted by the phones to technical problems preventing
completion of calls, the report (GAO-07-875) stated. The review found
instances where the centers fell short of standards in other areas, such as
medical care, use of force and food services, but said these instances did
not necessarily indicate a larger pattern of noncompliance. "While it
is true that the only pervasive problem we identified related to the
telephone system -- a problem later confirmed by ICE's testing -- we cannot
state that the other deficiencies we identified in our visits were
isolated," said Richard Stana, director of homeland security and
justice issues at GAO, in the report. GAO recommended that ICE regularly
update the posted numbers for legal services, consulates and reporting
violations of detainee treatment standards and test phone systems to ensure
that they are in working order. In a response to a draft of the report,
Steven Pecinovsky, director of the Homeland Security Department's
GAO/Office of the Inspector General Liaison Office, said ICE concurred with
its recommendations and had taken immediate steps to implement them. In
particular, ICE has started random testing to ensure the phones can access
the necessary numbers. While GAO did not find evidence of widespread
disregard for national detention standards, there have been recent calls
for more oversight of immigrant detention facilities and codification of
standards. According to the American Bar Association's Commission on
Immigration, the fact that the standards are not codified means "their
violation does not confer a cause of action in court." On Monday, the
American Civil Liberties Union called on Congress to codify the standards,
expressing concern over the causes of death for the 62 immigrants who have
died in ICE custody since 2004. GAO's report cited several instances of
noncompliance in the standards for medical care, but almost all were a
failure to complete the routine physical exams required for all detainees.
The only other issue cited was the failure of one detention center to have
a first aid kit available. The ACLU argued there are far more serious
medical failures occurring in immigrant detention centers. "Inadequate
medical care has led to unnecessary suffering and death," the ACLU
said in a statement. "In addition, there is no mechanism in place for
reporting deaths in immigration detention to any oversight body, including
the [Office of the Inspector General] and, therefore, there are no routine
investigations into deaths in ICE custody."
September 27, 2002
Security guards at the Wackenhut INS detention facility in Aurora quelled a
disturbance Thursday. The disruption was caused by several detainees during
the lunch hour, said Nina Pruneda- Muniz, Denver District spokeswoman for
the Immigration and Naturalization Service. "It got handled in a very
timely manner," Pruneda-Muniz said. "We were able to defuse any
situation from going any further." Agents were determining how many prisoners
were involved and why the confrontation erupted, she said. (Rocky Mountain
News)
Australian Federal Government
October 11, 2011 Canberra Times
The Commonwealth Government is suing its former immigration detention
operators for failing to protect it against lawsuits lodged by people kept
in detention facilities. The case will be heard in the South Australian
Supreme Court on November 21. It is part of a long-running case launched by
former asylum-seeker Abdul Amir Hamidi, who won a confidential settlement
against the Federal Government after almost five years in detention. As The
Canberra Times revealed on Saturday, Mr Hamidi's lawyers predict that the
confidential settlement will spark dozens more claims for damages. In a
case to be heard on November 21, the Commonwealth will claim its former
detention centre operators - GSL and Australasian Correctional Services -
breached their contracts by exposing the Government to the legal action.
The Commonwealth will argue both companies agreed to indemnify it against
damages based on their running of Australian detention centres.
Australasian Correctional Services operated Australia's mainland
immigration detention facilities until early 2004. Group 4 Falck Global
Solutions Pty Ltd (which later changed its name to Global Solutions
Limited, or GSL) commenced management of the centres in late 2003. Both
companies will fight the claim, with ACS arguing it had insufficient time
to respond to the allegations and the terms of its agreement included
dispute resolution measures. GSL says it is not responsible for
indemnifying the Commonwealth for any ''negligent, wilful, reckless or
unlawful acts or omissions of the Commonwealth, its employees, officers or
agents''. Between 2000 and March 2010, detainees in Australian immigration
detention centres were paid more than $12.3million in compensation for
personal injury or unlawful detention.
July 9,
2004 Australian
A damning report by the Auditor-General, released two weeks ago, showed
initial detention arrangements with private prison operators Australian
Centre Management to be a farce. Appalling hygiene and frequent escapes
perpetuated by ACM's lackadaisical attitude to detainees was highlighted as
a failure of the immigration department. With a second report by the
Auditor-General expected to detail arrangements with ACM's replacement
Global Systems Management later this year, the department maintains it.
June
19, 2004 Courier Mail
Australasian Correctional Management ran 12 immigration detention centres
on behalf of the Howard Government from early 1998 until early this
year. According to the Australian National Audit Office report, the
Department of Immigration, Indigenous and Multicultural Affairs had no
strategy for detaining asylum seekers, let alone a contract management plan
with ACM. The damning report found: No risk management strategy in
the contract. No contract management training or guidance. No
performance targets and an ad hoc approach to changing numbers. No
contract monitoring or assessment. No financial risk strategy or
asset management plan. "This meant that DIMIA was not able to
assess whether its strategies were actually working in practice," the
report said. During the contract the number of detainees varied from
just a handful in 1998 to 3000 in the year 2000. And the auditors
could find no assurance that the financial aspects of the $500 million
contract "operated as intended". The report also found a
gap in the audit trail. "Invoicing procedures where the audit trail
between the services provided and payments made did not provide senior
managers with assurance that full value for money was being achieved,"
it said. "A systematic approach to risk management, including
the establishment of an appropriate and documented risk management
strategy, should have been an integral part of contract management,"
the auditors said. According to the report a manual for departmental
centre managers was not issued until four years after the contract began
and had not been kept up to date. In its response to the report the
department agreed with the six recommendations made by the auditors.
It defended itself by saying the audit did not "fully reflect and take
account of the complexity of the environment and the nature of the previous
detention contract". "Many aspects of the contract were
intended to be flexibly addressed through negotiation and discussion,"
it said. Opposition immigration spokesman Stephen Smith demanded the
return of immigration detention centres to government management.
"The report is a comprehensive condemnation of the Government's policy
of the privatisation of the management of immigration detention centres and
a comprehensive indictment of DIMIA's administration of it," Mr Smith
said. The auditors found that 38 of the 100 immigration detention
standards issued by the department had no performance measures and another
37 were only partially covered. Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone's
spokesman did not respond to the report.
Australian Immigration Department
Companies Use Immigration Crackdown to
Turn a Profit: Expose on immigration by Nina Bernstein
at the New York Times, September 28, 2011
July 19, 2005 The Age
The Immigration Department is under fire again for failing to protect a
woman who was sexually abused in front of her daughter in a detention
centre. The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission has found
that the department failed in its duty of care and breached her human
rights. The woman, an Iranian refugee from a minority religious
group, complained of two violent attacks by other detainees at the Curtin
detention centre in Western Australia. In one incident a man had tried to
rape her, and in another a man punched her in the chest and face, tore her
clothes off and broke her finger. Her young daughter, who came to her aid,
was also punched. In preliminary findings seen by The Age, Human
Rights Commission president John von Doussa slammed the department and the
manager of the Curtin centre, Australasian Correctional Management.
News of his finding follows the damning indictment of the department over
the illegal detention of Cornelia Rau and the mistaken deportation of
Vivian Alvarez Solon. In his report last week, former Federal Police
commissioner Mick Palmer identified "a serious cultural problem"
and called for urgent reform.
Baker Community Correctional Facility, San Bernardino, California
November 26, 2011 The Daily Press
The state has canceled its contract with the privately operated Desert
View Modified Community Correctional Facility, putting about 150 workers
out of a job. Desert View's contract termination officially takes effect
Wednesday, though prison employees told the Daily Press that The Geo Group
Inc. has been preparing to deactivate the prison at Rancho and Aster roads
since May. The 643-bed medium-security prison is shuttering its doors as
part of California’s realignment plan, which responds to federal orders to
reduce state prison overcrowding by shifting responsibility for tens of
thousands of low-level offenders to county governments. To help deal with
the new influx of inmates under local supervision, the California
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is encouraging counties to
enter into their own contracts with more than a dozen former CCFs. The CCFs
had generally housed inmates with sentences shorter than 18 months, parole
violators and offenders with scheduled release dates — the same types of
nonviolent, non-sexual or non-serious offenders now serving out sentences
in county jails instead of state prisons. “We hope that counties contract
with these facilities to save jobs and ease inmate housing concerns that
many counties may have,” CDCR spokeswoman Dana Toyama said. But San
Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department officials say they’re not planning
to privatize jail beds. The math just doesn’t pencil out, according to
Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Cindy Bachman. “The issue with taking
advantage of private prisons or private jail facilities has come up over
and over again throughout the years; however, it’s not something that the
county is considering,” Bachman said. “It’s too costly and there’s just not
the funding really even to consider something like that.” The California
State Association of Counties has created a document outlining potential
beds at the former CCFs, but counties statewide have been hesitant to
exercise that option. The Geo Group had operated six of the nine privately
run CCFs that lost their state contracts, according to CSAC. Five other
CCFs were run by local governments. The facilities ranged from around 100
employees to more than 600, according to Toyama.
Baxter Immigration Detention
Centre, Australia
September 13, 2008 Sidney Morning Herald
About 10 o'clock one evening in January 2003, Mary Rohde got out of her
four-wheel-drive to lock the gate to the visitor carpark at the Baxter
immigration detention facility near Port Augusta, where she was a detention
officer. She felt a presence but saw no one, and returned to the car to
radio the control room. Suddenly an arm was round her neck, a blade at her
throat. Terror and incomprehension overwhelmed her. Eventually the arm
loosened and she looked round; in the back seat was her boss. It had been a
security drill. "That'll teach her to lock the car door," a
supervisor later remarked. Rhode was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress
disorder and, five years later, has not recovered, despite psychiatric
treatment. Her symptoms are typical. She suffers from nightmares and
insomnia. She cannot manage social situations, cannot sit in a doctor's
waiting room; even visits from her adult children are too much to cope with.
Half an hour after they arrive she finds herself weeping in her bedroom.
"I'm now the shell of the person I was. I drink and take drugs; for me
to cope, that's what I have to do," she says. Rohde is one of many
former officers who developed post-traumatic stress disorder and other
stress-related disorders while working in detention centres around
Australia. Statistics from WorkCover South Australia record 62 claims for
post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental disorders made by guards at
Woomera and Baxter. Many are unlikely to work again. We have been told a
lot about the impact of detention on asylum seekers, but not about the
impact on those who worked there. By 1999 leaky vessels were making their
way to Australia carrying mostly asylum seekers from Iraq, Iran and
Afghanistan. Arrival numbers overwhelmed detention centres at Curtin and
Port Hedland, both in northern Western Australia. The overflow shifted to a
makeshift camp near Woomera, South Australia, where they languished in
desert heat until given visas or sent home. Five hundred kilometres from
Adelaide, with access to the detention centre barred to almost all, it was
impossible for outsiders to know what happened within. Woomera's carrying
capacity was 400. By April 2000 it held more than 1400 detainees, and
officers were needed to keep order. Detention services were privatised by
the Howard government in 1997. The successful tenderer was Australasian
Correctional Management, or ACM, a subsidiary of the US giant Wackenhut
corporation, which ran private jails in Australia and overseas. Many ACM
detention centre officers had been jail staff but the company also
advertised for them. With free accommodation and the minimum requirement of
five 12-hour shifts a week, the conditions seemed excellent - about $1200 a
week. For Rohde, recently separated from her husband and experiencing
financial difficulties, the job seemed a godsend. Many officers believed
they were on important duty. In 2000 Australians got the message they were
under siege; that the boatloads surely included terrorists. Still others
thought this was a chance to show kindness. Within weeks, the new recruits
would find themselves kitted up in riot gear and wielding batons,
extinguishing fires, or cutting down would-be suicides. Trevor Robertson
signed up to Woomera in June 2000. He had recently completed training as a
prison officer in Brisbane. His partner, Kendall Jones, expecting their
first child, urged him to apply. As with Rohde, the move would be the
mistake of their lives. An imposing figure, Robertson was respected by
colleagues and soon became a supervisor. When Woomera closed and the
operation transferred to the Baxter centre near Port Augusta, Robertson
went too. One former colleague remembers him as even-tempered, fair and good
in a crisis - "the best operator at Woomera". Robertson has been
unable to work, his marriage teeters in the balance, and he rarely leaves
the loungeroom of his modest Port Augusta home. He does not socialise, and
spends his time bent over the computer, poring over state and federal law,
or on the phone to any bureaucrat or politician who will talk to him about
immigration detention. It is an obsession. He has reflected long and hard
about why it all went so wrong in immigration detention centres. All the
officers interviewed for this story said training was inadequate. In an
intensive four- to six-week course, new recruits practised restraint and
riot drills, became familiar with the Migration Act, and were encouraged to
treat detainees with respect. Robertson does not think any training could
have prepared officers for the dire daily situations. He told ABC TV's Four
Corners program that three days after training he was at Woomera when 500
detainees attempted to escape. The job was close to impossible. Detention
centres became violent; chaos reigned. These desert prisons held people who
were distressed and traumatised for months or years on end, waiting for
news on their visa applications. Many eventually became deranged. Riots,
hunger strikes, self-harm and suicide attempts were common. Officers became
the focus of detainee anger and resentment, and threats were made against
them and their families. It angers Robertson that he and colleagues were
denied help. "We were the police; we were the mental health-care
workers; we were the social workers," he recalls bitterly. Detention
centres had rules, and most detainees obeyed them. A core group, however,
was troublesome and the only consequence of their behaviour was
incarceration in the "management unit", a form of solitary
confinement where detainees frequently became so unmanageable it was easier
to return them to their compounds. Troublemakers lit fires, smashed
windows, stood over and bullied others and assaulted officers with relative
impunity. Experts argue that incarceration in detention centres induces
mental illness. According to ACM statistics for October 2001, three
psychologists saw 764 residents at Woomera. A psychiatrist visited every
few weeks, but daily care of people with mental illness was left to
untrained officers. Rod Gigney, a kindly officer, would bribe Anna with
fruit, trying to curb her behaviour. The young woman wandered around naked
at Baxter and defecated on the floor. To officers less sympathetic, Anna
was just a heroin-addicted, damned nuisance. She turned out to be the
schizophrenic German-born Australian Cornelia Rau. Gigney made many reports
about Anna to management, without effect. Carol Wiltshire was deeply
concerned about a woman who had not left her room for 10 months. She was catatonic,
covered in bedsores and unable to tend to her small child. Wiltshire's
supervisor suggested she "poke her with a stick and see if she's still
alive". It was another month before she was transferred to Adelaide's
Glenside mental health facility. Understaffing was significant and chronic.
Often an officer as young as 20 would be left alone in a compound where
three officers were required, leaving them vulnerable and insecure. Sean
Ferris was alone at Baxter when a riot broke out. He locked himself in the
office, which was pounded with stones and set alight. Simon Forsyth, then
21, faced a fire on his first shift at Baxter. He did not know how to use
the extinguisher. An October 2005 report recounts the incident that ended
Robertson's career. By then, Baxter detainees were predominantly visa
overstayers and criminals awaiting deportation. There was a fight,
Robertson was assaulted and "suddenly I lost control". "I
was really trying to hurt people; I had my hands around their throats."
And that was that. The once solid and reliable officer, mentor to fellow
workers, finally cracked. Battered, bruised and hysterical, he was driven
home. When he said he was fit to return to work three weeks later, he broke
down, was subsequently diagnosed with an adjustment disorder and has not
worked since. Clive Skinn, a Port Augusta local who worked at Woomera and
Baxter, loathes all detainees. Sitting uncomfortably on the couch in
Robertson's lounge room, he is tense with anger. "My body is full of
hatred," Skinn says. He had not given refugees a thought before he
went to Woomera; he knew nothing about Muslims. On his second day on the
job, a detainee head-butted him. Another spat at him soon after. Wiltshire
says Skinn was never the same after having to cut down a man who attempted
to hang himself. Life became unmanageable. Skinn was quick to anger, could
not get on with his children, could not sleep. He awoke suddenly one
morning convinced that there were Muslims in his house. He seized a chair
and trashed the place, smashed windows and the TV, broke holes in the
walls. He was diagnosed with anxiety and depression and spent 18 months on
workers' compensation. While still profoundly affected, he holds down a job
in an underground mine at Roxby Downs, but the past catches up with him.
"I'd like to kill them all," Skinn says of detainees. "And I
feel the same way about the children. They were as bad as the
parents." Gigney's breakdown was a consequence of concern for
detainees. He listened to their despair, smuggled extra milk rations for
children, and watched helplessly as they suffered physically and mentally.
A boy, 12, was among the three would-be suicides he cut down. Officers who
displayed compassion were held in contempt by many co-workers, and became
known as "care bears". The diminutive and softly spoken Annie
Brown (not her real name), 55, thought working at Baxter would be an
opportunity to help the unfortunate. Each day she would say to herself,
"I've got 12 hours to make these people's lives better." For this
she was taunted and ridiculed by fellow officers; for Annie, the worst part
of work at Baxter was the attitude of many co-workers. Annie's husband is
also a former Baxter officer. "We were people who had normal
lives," Annie says through tears. "We don't have them any
more." After being ignored by superiors, she was diagnosed with
post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, depression and agoraphobia, and
for a year could not leave her house. Many people with post-traumatic
stress disorder have to confront the fact that what was normality is not
likely to return. This is Rohde's reality. "I want my life back,"
she says. "But the psychiatrist has said that I will never be the
person I was before. I have to try to learn to live with the person I am now."
Three years since his diagnosis, Robertson shows no sign of improvement.
For Kendall, life with Trevor is close to unbearable. She says he is
distant, obnoxious and arrogant. He gets angry with the children,
impatient, distracted. He does not go to bed until 3am, and rises late. As
Jones and Robertson do seemingly fruitless battle with bureaucrats, they
are frustrated that former detainees can pursue compensation for
psychological damage but former officers cannot. Gigney continues to try to
find work. In his home town of Whyalla the mining boom is in full swing,
but being sound of body is not enough for him to take advantage of it. He
has just made his second attempt to get a truck driver's licence. He would
pulled over to answer his phone when a water truck went past, triggering a
flashback to the water cannon used during riots at Woomera, and an incident
involving children. He sat in the cabin and wept. In the suburban Adelaide
pub where she works as a kitchenhand, Wiltshire shares a drink with another
former officer, Barbara Zillner. The camaraderie among former officers is
akin to that between Vietnam War veterans - no one else comprehends what
they went through. In 2000 Wiltshire, a single mother doing it tough, saw
Woomera as a chance to escape the poverty trap. Like others, she broke
down, diagnosed with an adjustment disorder. Her road to recovery has been
hard, but she now holds down a job and a relationship. Having recovered a
measure of equilibrium in her life, she looks back and wonders at what she
went through. "I was proud to be a detention centre officer,
protecting Australia's borders. Then I changed. I became a monster, a
cowboy, like all the other officers. They were all driven crazy. When I
look back, I just think - what the hell did I do that for? To end up hating
people for no reason."
March 3, 2006 Sidney Morning Herald
A DAY of turmoil in the nation's immigration system ended with the
Federal Government backing down on several fronts yesterday. It agreed to
pay damages to a boy traumatised in detention and allowed a deported
Melbourne man to return to Australia on humanitarian grounds. A damning
report released by an independent auditor yesterday also raised questions
about a successful 2003 bid by the immigration detention contractor GSL,
whose contract the Government refused to renew on Wednesday. In Sydney, an
11-year-old Iranian, Shayan Badraie, was offered damages for trauma he
suffered in Woomera and Villawood detention centres. The move comes after a
63-day Supreme Court hearing. While in detention between March 2000 and
August 2001, the boy became severely traumatised after witnessing riots, a
stabbing and a string of other disturbing incidents. He subsequently spent
94 days in hospital, and still requires treatment. Commonwealth lawyers
approached lawyers representing Shayan this week to offer a settlement for
damages. The exact sum will be fixed at a hearing this morning but is
expected to be more than $1 million. Meanwhile, the immigration detention
contractor GSL was found to have been hired even though it was more
expensive and provided inferior services to competitors, the National Audit
Office announced yesterday. GSL's bid was $32.6 million higher than that of
the incumbent detention centre operator, ACM, when the latter's bid
expired. The audit office found the basis on which ACM was paid $5.7
million after it missed out on the contract was "doubtful", since
the department was only required to compensate for matters pertaining to
detention. Immigration could not provide evidence of the criteria under
which the sum was paid. The audit also found the head of the steering
committee, which was heavily involved in the evaluation of the bids, gave a
reference for ACM's bid. An independent probity adviser told the steering
committee seven months later that this should not happen again.
July
29, 2004
Two murals border a grassy patch in the fenced-in adult education compound
of the Baxter immigration detention centre. Goldfish feature in one.
The other, still being painted by detainees yesterday, is an abstract
composition of nine blue eyes and brown faces. For the first time
since the fires in 2002, journalists were allowed in the centre. An Iranian
detainee, who said he had been in detention for about four years, waited
until the Immigration Department official was out of earshot before he
started whispering to the Herald. The mural of the eyes represented
confusion, he explained. "People don't know what they're doing,
they've lost their personality, they don't know what happens to them,"
he said. And the fish? "If you scream underwater, nobody
hears your voice, if you're crying, nobody hears." One area the
media had never seen before was the grim "Management Unit", where
detainees with behavioural issues are put into solitary confinement - sometimes
for more than a month at a time. The Red compound, burnt during the
fires in 2002, is for "problem" detainees who have come out of
the "Management Unit" and are being "re-integrated"
into the general detention centre population. There were no detainees
in the Red compound yesterday either - just empty non-carpeted rooms with
metal furniture bolted to the floor and a peephole for guards to look
through when doing their head counts each night. (Sidney Morning
Mail)
November
20, 2003
A High Court judge has cleared the way for a challenge to Australia's
detention laws that could ultimately result in all children being released
from immigration detention centres. High Court Justice Kenneth Hayne
ruled in Melbourne yesterday that the challenge, launched by refugee
advocate Eric Vadarlis, could proceed to a February hearing before the
court's full bench. The legal action aims to free four child detainees from
South Australia's Baxter Detention Centre on the grounds that the detention
of children for administrative purposes is unconstitutional. (The
Age)
July
30, 2003
An Iranian man at the Baxter detention centre has refused to eat for
the past 18 days after his seven-year-old daughter was sent back to
Iran, the Australian Democrats said today. Kate Reynolds,
Democrats' social justice spokeswoman in South Australia's upper house,
called for authorities to provide medical care and grief counseling to
Amin Mastipour (Amin Mastipour), who was on a hunger strike in a Baxter
isolation unit. "I cannot believe that this man's child - who
has been with him for the past five years - has been torn away from him
like this," Ms Reynolds said. (Sidney Morning News)
July
27, 2003
Alamdar Bakhtiyari, who has spent three of his mere 15 years living in
detention, says he never wants to come out. He says he feels safer behind
Baxter detention centre's razor wire. As he sits with The Age,
his angry father at his side, Alamdar is edgy, fearful. His face switches
like a flashing light, now scowling, now smiling. When he does speak,
his words tumble out filled with accusations and disbelief. "It is not
fair you come and talk to us, and then you go home to your family and a
nice house and we stay here. We are not free to leave. You have lovely
homes and families, but all we have is nothing, not even our freedom.
"I am not allowed to enjoy freedom like other boys. It makes me crazy,
I hate it here. I hate Australia. I am not a criminal, I have done nothing
wrong." Then the switch is thrown again. "You know what ACM
stands for?" he says flashing a smile. "Always Changing their
Minds." Australasian Correctional Management (ACM) is the private
company that runs Baxter and decides what Alamdar can and cannot do.
After almost three years of detention, Alamdar, with his younger brother
Montazar (Monty), bears all the signs of someone completely
institutionalised. His fear of the outside world outweighs his fear of
incarceration. He says his life has been torn apart by the competing forces
in Australia's immigration debate: the refugee activists, the lawyers, the
media and Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock. Alamdar carries the
scars of detention, some of which are still visible. At the height of the
Woomera turmoil, when riots and hunger strikes were commonplace and teenage
detainees were threatening to kill themselves and drinking shampoo, Alamdar
stitched his lips together. Out of frustration he slashed himself
repeatedly with razor blades, and in a moment of deep despair he gouged the
word "freedom" into his forearm. (The Age)
April
21, 2003
South Australian police have apologized to protestors after a heavily
tactical response squad drove into their camp near the Baxter detention
centre searching for a rifle that had allegedly been aimed at a police
helicopter. The search of the site turned up a camera tripod. A
total of 33 people were arrested during the three-day Easter protest
against mandatory detention of asylum seekers. More than 350 police
were on hand for the protests. But as protesters left, riot police
charged at selected groups to clear them from the area. (The Age)
April
18, 2003
Police clashed with protesters outside the Baxter detention centre today
after demonstrators climbed barricades and tried to march on the
centre. Ignoring police appeals to remain beyond a roadblock erected
to seal access to the centre, hundreds of protesters confronted police in a
tense stand-off this afternoon. Some protesters climbed the
barricades and attempted to make their way on foot to the centre's main
gates, before a second line of police blocked their path and began
confiscating camping equipment. Hundreds of protesters from around
Australia have converged on Port Augusta to rally against the government's
treatment of asylum seekers. Some 300 police officers were redeployed
to Port Augusta this weekend, after last year's Easter rally at the Woomera
detention centre, during which detainees staged several mass escapes with
the help of demonstrators. Refugee Action Collective protest
organiser Fleur Taylor, from Melbourne, said centre manager Australasian
Correctional Management (ACM), authorized by the Department of Immigration
(DIMIA), had increased punishment of Baxter detainees. (The Age)
March
10, 2003
Two men who escaped from the Baxter immigration detention centre last night
spent just hours on the run before being recaptured by South Australian
police early today. Police said the men fled into bushland north of
the Port Augusta facility at 11.18pm (CDT). A search involving local
police and Australian Federal Police was organised, including the use of a
police aircraft. (The Age)
January
3, 2003
It was meant to be the new, friendlier face of
Australia's asylum seeker policy. Although an electrified fence runs around
the outside, and security cameras are everywhere except in private areas,
the rooms are modern. There is more grass and play area for children than
in other centres. But today part of Baxter lies in ruins, and along with it
any hope of an easy resolution to the fate of Australia's asylum seekers. Just
after midnight on Friday last week a fire broke out in an empty room in Red
1, a men's compound at Baxter. Although detainees cannot possess matches or
lighters, arsonists may have made a lighter from electric wiring or a
toaster. They had mattresses and newspapers - plenty of fuel. Two
nights later, a bigger fire was lit in Red 1. Staff tried to put it out but
did not have enough water. Fire crews arrived, people were banging on doors
to wake those still asleep. Many detainees were collapsing from smoke
inhalation. At
about 3pm that day more fires were lit. Desperate to get out but told not
to, detainees broke down the gate and tried to break out of the compound.
Guards in riot gear confronted them. When some detainees were asked why
they had started the fire they replied: "We were trying to get away.
The centre is making us crazy." By Sunday night the fires were spreading, first to
Port Hedland detention centre, later to Woomera, Christmas Island and
Villawood. The "ferocity" of the actions took guards by surprise,
an ACM employee said. On
December 17, newspapers in Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and Melbourne
published the same article. Carrying headlines such as "Five Star
Asylums" and "It's not all mriots at our Club Fed", it reported that
detainees enjoyed luxuries such as gyms, Foxtel, DVDs and yoga classes. The
article, and a similar one in a Port Hedland newspaper, made some people in
the Port Hedland detention centre "very angry," says the town's
Uniting Church minister, Bev Fabb. She says most of the article's
information was wrong for Port Hedland. The article also troubled Harry
Minas of the Federal Government's Independent Detention Advisory Group. Neither
Professor Minas nor Ms Fabb suggest a direct link between the article and
the arson but many asylum seeker advocates feel the article helped to
exacerbate what one advocate describes as a "huge deterioration"
in the mood of detainees in the past month. A shift
is under way in the centres. Numbers are dwindling. No boat has reached Australia
for 14 months. Baxter, Woomera and Port Hedland are way below capacity. On New
Year's Eve the Immigration Department handed a letter to 488 detainees in
Baxter, Port Hedland and Woomera. The letter said most of them had been
rejected as refugees and had "no right to remain in this country . . .
You can choose to bring your detention to an end at any time by leaving
Australia". According
to what an Iranian detainee told asylum seeker advocate Ian Knowles, a
group of men, infuriated by the letter, marched to the immigration office
and demanded to be deported straight away. Guards
in riot gear pushed them back to a compound. ACM confirmed that tear gas
was used. Mr
Minas adds: "People are saying, 'It's their (the detainees') own
bloody fault', and in a way it is. "But people have to ask what makes this group
prefer be in a detention centre environment rather than to go go home. "They
are not choosing a soft life in Australia." (The Age)
January
3, 2003
Thirteen pairs of scissors, two chisels, home-made weapons, broken glass
panels and lighter fluid have been found after searches in Australia's
seven immigration detention centres. But strip searches of the 132
men detained at Baxter and Woomera in South Australia, conducted this week,
apparently uncovered little. An Immigration Department statement
refers only to two mobile phones and one screwdriver being found. The
five-day spree of violence in five of the seven immigration detention
centres has left a damages bill of $8.4 million. The bill climbed
$400,000 yesterday after the Immigration Department revealed the cost of
fires at Christmas Island four days ago. (The Age)
December
29, 2002
Asylum seekers who caused more than $2 million in
damage by using bedding and furniture to fuel six separate fires at the
three-month-old Baxter Detention Centre in South Australia face jail terms
before being deported. One of the
centre's nine compounds was destroyed after five fires began simultaneously
early yesterday, and 13 people, including two guards, were taken to
hospital. Forty-seven
detainees were evacuated to another compound within the centre, where
another big fire broke out shortly after 3.30pm. Eighty-one rooms were destroyed,
including 17 in the second compound. Two en suite units were destroyed and
a mess hall was damaged. According
to the Department of Immigration website, riots in detention centres have
caused more than $5 million in damage over the past 18 months. More than
three-quarters of this has occurred at Woomera Detention Centre, where six
buildings were destroyed in riots in August 2000 and a further three burnt
during riots in November last year. (Sidney Morning Hearld)
December
27, 2002
Inmates at South Australia's Baxter detention centre used mattresses and
newspapers to light three fires that gutted a complex of four rooms,
Australasian Correctional Management said yesterday. The fires, which
caused an estimated $60,000 damage, have been referred by the Department of
Immigration to Australian Federal Police for investigation. A
spokesman for Australasian Correctional Management, which is contracted to
run the Baxter immigration detention centre, said the fires had been lit in
the single men's complex, which included two bedrooms and two toilet
areas. (The Age)
November
6, 2002
Up to 30 detainees at South Australia's Baxter detention centre were hit by
nearly 50 guards in full riot gear last week and then refused medical
treatment, according to an asylum seeker. Afghan Fahim Shah said
about eight detainees were hurt last Thursday's attack in the mess where
about 30 people were eating dinner. "They threw my plate and
beat me with the stick and pushed me three times with the shield to go
outside from the mess," he said. He said there had been two
other incidents of brutality by Australasian Correctional Management guards
at the centre since it opened about six weeks ago. (The Age)
Ben
Reid Community CF,
Houston, Texas (AKA Southeast Texas Transitional Center)
Aug 21 ,2019
houstonchronicle.com
Lawsuit: Private prison contractor abandoned parolees at flooded halfway
house during Harvey
More than 200 former inmates are suing a private
prison contractor who they say “utterly failed” them during Hurricane
Harvey, allegedly leaving the men in a flooded halfway house in Houston
surrounded by toxic waste and without food, clean water or medical care.
Despite the “barbaric” conditions, according to the lawsuit, the men
couldn’t leave the premises because officials told them it would be a
violation of their parole. “It was a total disaster,” said Henry Thigpen,
one of the roughly 500 parolees who weathered the storm at the Southeast
Texas Transitional Center before officials sent them all back to prison.
“They left us there to fend for ourselves.” Attorneys for GEO Group, the massive
private prison contractor that runs the eastern Harris County facility,
denied the allegations in court filings but declined to offer any
additional comment to the Houston Chronicle. “Plaintiffs no doubt
experienced inconveniences during Hurricane Harvey flooding, just like the
STTC staff and nearly every resident of Harris County and southeast Texas,”
the company’s lawyers wrote. “Like nearly all of Houston, the flooding made
plaintiffs normal routines impossible.” On HoustonChronicle.com: Listen: A podcast
from death row, and the story of Larry Swearingen. But, the lawyers said,
the flooding never reached over calf-height, the staff never abandoned the
facility and there was always adequate food and water on hand. The parolees
who were there begged to differ. “They don’t know,” said Everett Crawford,
a 63-year-old from Bexar County. “They abandoned us.” The GEO Group-run
facility on Beaumont Highway is a former bible college that contracts with
the Texas Department of Criminal Justice to house parolees fresh out of
prison as they work to get back on their feet. The men there - some of whom
are sex offenders with ankle monitors - are allowed to have cellphones and
jobs and they don’t have to wear prison uniforms. But there’s still a gate
and they’re not free to come and go as they please according to the
conditions of their parole. After the storm hit Houston on a Friday -
August 25, 2017 - parts of the campus started taking on water. Most of the
staff allegedly abandoned their posts as the flooding rose to waist-deep in
some places, according to the lawsuit. Men began moving their belongings up
to the second floor, retreating from the foul-smelling water. Some read or
listened to the radio, while others sang gospel music or prayed as they
tried to figure out what to do. “There was no clean water,” said
Houston-based attorney Scott Arnold, one of the lawyers who is representing
the men in court. “You’d turn on the faucet and you’d get brown stuff
coming up.” Some of the men raided the kitchen for scraps of food, he said,
while others went hungry. At one point, according to Thigpen, a few of the
guys waded through miles of floodwater to the nearest store, a process that
took hours. In the end, the men were
“nearly starved, were dehydrated and incurred rashes, infections and other
injuries from the toxic flood waters,” the suit alleges. In part, that’s
because the facility sits between a former superfund site, a landfill and a
waste processing plant, “all of which flooded and subjected Plaintiffs of
up to waist-high water filled with the filth and toxins from the
surrounding landfill and toxic waste facility.” Many of the men had medical
and mental health conditions that required monitoring and medication, “none
of which was available,” according to the lawsuit. Instead, the parolees
said they took care of their comrades themselves. “It still haunts me
today,” said Thigpen. “I’d neve been in a situation like that where I had
to take care of mentally ill and handicapped people. We had to physically
hold them down so they wouldn’t go out there and drown.” GEO Group offered
a very different narrative of the hurricane conditions, writing that the
floodwaters peaked at around 18 inches, below the bottom of first-floor
bunk beds. “Affected parolees and their bedding were temporarily moved to
the second floor of their dorms,” the company’s attorneys wrote. “The
facility staff stayed on-site around the clock to mitigate the flooding, to
maintain essential functions like the kitchen and the medication room, and
to conduct rounds, roll calls, and counts.” The halfway house staff was not
only “fully present” throughout the storm and weathering the “exact same
conditions” as the parolees, according to GEO Group’s response filing, but
there were actually more employees there than usual and the claims that
they abandoned their posts is “baseless.” One thing that both sides agree
on is that on August 29 - four days into it - the flood waters subsided
enough for prison staff to come pick up the men. That night, the men said,
they were all loaded onto Texas Department of Criminal Justice buses at
gunpoint and shipped to various state prisons. In the process they were
forced to abandon all their belongings, and some said they found their
things missing weeks later when they returned to the facility. In the
nearly two years since the storm, some of the men - including Thigpen and
Crawford - moved out on their own. They’re both still on parole.
Oct 8, 2012 HoustonPress.com
The rapist of a 16-year-old girl is the latest sexual predator to slip
through the sieve that is the privately run Southeast Texas Transitional
Center. Thomas Lee Elkins, convicted of aggravated kidnapping and sexual
assault in 1991, absconded from the facility, 10950 Old Beaumont Highway,
October 5, according to reports. He's the sixth offender to float away from
Southeast in 24 months. Formerly known as the Ben A. Reid Community
Correctional Facility, Southeast is run by the Florida-based GEO Group,
which, despite its appalling track record in Texas and elsewhere, keeps
getting sweet state contracts. But hey, what's the big deal about losing a
child rapist or two, right? Elkins is 6-3, about 200 lbs., and has a
"Fu Manchu" mustache, which we're totally sure he hasn't shaved.
We're also sure GEO Group won't have to pay any sort of penalty for this
escape. They certainly weren't held accountable when another resident,
Anthony Ray Ferrell, took a stroll in October 2010 and wound up gunning
down a Good Samaritan who tried to stop Ferrell from stealing a woman's
purse at a gas station. Look, clearly the Texas Department of Criminal
Justice has more important things to do -- like monitor employees' Facebook
use -- than make sure its contractors, like, keep the public safe and
stuff. Anyone want to take bets on how long it'll be before another
degenerate escapes?
April
6, 2012 Houston Press Blogs
A high-risk child rapist who hopped over his halfway house's barbed wire
fence Thursday night is the fifth sex offender to abscond from the
privately run Southeast Texas Transitional Center in 18 months. According
to the Houston Chronicle story linked above, authorities say Michael Elbert
Young, who might be "mentally unstable if not taking medication,"
removed his electronic tracking monitor. He was "released from prison
after serving eight years for two aggravated assault convictions. Both were
sex related. He also served a 20-year term for sexual assault of a child
and attempted aggravated sexual assault." Oh, and he has a history of
using knives. Owned and operated by Florida-based GEO Group, the facility
at 10950 Old Beaumont Highway was formerly known as the Ben A. Reid
Community Correctional Facility. Apparently, since GEO can't keep track of
its convicted sexual predators, it just figured changing the name would
solve the problem. After all, it's much cheaper than hiring a competent
staff and improving security. In October 2010, Anthony Ray Ferrell walked
out of Southeast Texas/Ben A. Reid, and was later charged with gunning down
a Good Samaritan who intervened when Ferrell allegedly tried to snatch a
woman's purse inside a gas station convenience store. A week before Ferrell
strolled off the grounds, Bruce McCain, convicted of two sexual assaults in
1986, fled the facility. In December 2010, Arthur William Brown, who had
served 31 years for aggravated sexual assault of two women and a
16-year-old, did the same. A month after that, sex offender Timothy Rosales
Jr. absconded. Although some of these folks were caught, the problem is, as
we wrote earlier, the place is like a freaking sieve, and GEO has a sweet
contract with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice: There's apparently
no repercussion for escapes, and once a resident absconds, it's no longer
GEO's problem. All GEO personnel have to do is pick up a phone and notify
real-life law enforcement officers. Thanks, GEO. We certainly feel safer
with y'all at the wheel. And thanks, TDCJ, for continuing to do business
with them.
January 25, 2011 KTRK
High risk, armed and dangerous are the words being used to describe a sex
offender who absconded from a Houston halfway house on Monday night. It's
been nearly 24 hours since Timothy Rosales, Jr. disappeared from the
halfway house and he is no where to be found. The Texas Department of
Public Safety has since added him to it's Top 10 Most Wanted Fugitives
list. Related Content More: Got a story idea? Let us know! Rosales was
doing maintenance work in the lobby of the Reid Center on Beaumont Highway
around 6:15pm Monday when he bolted through the front door, cut off his
electronic monitoring device around his ankle and fled. Rosales then did
not report back to his parole officer and a warrant was issued for his
arrest. Across the street at Melba's Country Kitchen, the owner and her
staff had no idea he'd absconded until today. Melba Barfield says she has
no reservations being this close to a halfway house where offenders can
leave, so long as they have an approved schedule. "I've been here nine
years and I've had absolutely no problems from the guys at the halfway
house. I know that several have walked away but they haven't stopped here
to get my dollar," said Barfield.
January 25, 2011 Houston Press Blogs
Timothy Rosales Jr. is the first rapist of 2011 to escape from the
privately run Ben Reid halfway house, and the second to escape in a little
over a month. The 39-year-old sex offender fled from the Beaumont Highway
facility around 6:15 Monday night, according to the Department of Public
Safety. He's considered armed and dangerous. And, like Arthur William
Brown, the rapist who escaped in late December, he was able to remove his
electronic monitoring ankle bracelet. We wrote about the unsecured Reid
facility, and its parent company, the Florida-based GEO Group, in December.
Two months before the story ran, Anthony Ray Ferrell escaped from Reid and
allegedly shot and killed a 24-year-old good Samaritan who intervened in a
gas station purse-snatching. Another rapist split the Reid facility a few
weeks before Ferrell slipped out. Although the place is like a freaking
sieve, there is nothing in GEO's contract with the Texas Department of
Criminal Justice about a maximum number of vicious sexual predators that can
be let loose on the public in a given amount of time. And once these
monsters step off the Reid premises, they're no longer GEO's problem: It is
up to actual real-life law enforcement officers to apprehend the escapees.
All GEO personnel need to do is pick up the phone and make a few calls once
they realize an offender hasn't returned on time. Needless to say, we're a
little concerned about the kind of people who are standing between the
public and some armed asshole who likes to rape 16-year-old kids. You know
who doesn't need to worry? GEO's top executives. Their salaries and
benefits are secure. They will continue to make money off the Reid
facility. And besides, their families don't live anywhere near the
facility. So what in the world would they have to worry about?
November 16, 2010 Houston Press
The man charged with killing a Good Samaritan during a purse-snatching is the
third person to escape the same state-contracted halfway house in the last
20 months. Anthony Ray Ferrell had fled a "halfway house in the 10900
block of Beaumont Highway" in October, according to the Houston
Chronicle. The home in that block is the Ben A. Reid Community Correctional
Facility, from which sex offender Bruce McCain escaped in October 2010 and
Richard Williamson Griffin Jr. escaped in February 2009. (McCain was
arrested in the Rio Grande Valley three weeks after his escape). The home
was operated by private prison group Cornell Companies, which was bought by
its main competitor, the Florida-based GEO Group, last April. The facility
"provides temporary housing, monitoring and transitional services for
500 minimum-security adult male offenders," according to Cornell
Companies literature. Its "security measures include 24-hour custodial
supervision, 12-foot perimeter fence, outdoor lighting, close circuit
cameras, secure entrances and frequent census checks." Cornell
Companies/GEO also operate Houston's Leidel Comprehensive Sanctions Center.
In 2005, before GEO bought Cornell, a Leidel resident who got a day-pass
for church and never bothered to return; he fled to Fort Worth, where he
killed three men. Ferrell is accused of murdering Sam Irick at a Meyerland
convenience store last week. Irick tried to intervene as Ferrell allegedly
was robbing a customer.
Big
Spring Complex, Big Spring, Texas
Nov 30, 2021
cbs7.com
Two private prisons in Big Spring are
closing this week
BIG SPRING, Texas (KOSA) -According to our media
partners at KBEST media, the Big Spring Correctional Institution and Big
Spring Flightline Correctional Institution are operated by the Geo Group,
both through a contract with the U.S. Department of Justice. That contract
with the Department of Justice ends tomorrow. Per President Biden's
executive order from January of this year ordering the D.O.J. not to renew
contracts with private prisons. KBEST reports 350 inmates currently in the
Big Spring and flightline facilities will be moved to other federal
facilities across the country. The geo group is working to transfer its 350
employees to other available positions within the geo group.
November 9, 2010 NewsWest 9
An accidental shooting on Tuesday at the federal prison in Big Spring put
an inmate in the hospital. The shooting happened right before noon at the
Flight Line Prison, located at the airpark in Big Spring. According to
medics, a Hispanic man was accidentally shot by a gun in the upper arm. The
wound was not serious, but he was taken to Scenic Mountain Medical Center
for a follow up. He was alert and conscious while being transported. We
still don't know how the prisoner was shot. Details are limited at this
time, but we've learned the shooting is under investigation. NewsWest 9 has
contacted the Geo Group, which currently runs the prison, and they have not
commented on the incident. NewsWest 9 will continue to follow this story
and will bring you the very latest information when we get it.
Bill Clayton Detention Center,
Littlefield, Texas
Texas prison boom going bust: by Mitch Mitchell, September 3, 2011, Star-Telegram.
Expose on troubles facing many communities that bought into the private
prison bonding scam.
Wanted: Inmates and Investors Texas
Lockups Go on the Block: July 19, 2011, Bond
Buyer: Private prison bonding not panacea.
September 16, 2011 KCBD
After auctioning off the Bill Clayton Detention Center back in July,
the City of Littlefield thought they were free from the financial strains.
However, the private bidder has backed out of their $6 million offer. The
private buyer made the offer via telephone during the July auction. Thirty
days after the bid, the contract on the property was supposed to close.
However, the City received word that the deal had fallen through. "It
didn't happen and the reason it didn't happen was because the person who put
in the highest bid basically backed out on their bid and kind of put us in
a tailspin," City Manager Danny Davis said. After years of
mismanagement and broken contracts, the $11 million dollar detention center
sat vacant. The city was left to foot the bill, still owing more than $9
million on the property. The city was certain the bid of $6 million would
help close the gap on their debt. The news of the bidder's change of heart
is frustrating for Davis. "With the detention center, nothing has
happened easy. It's been a struggle for us all along, so, in some ways, we
were not that surprised that we've got a continued struggle," Davis
said. It was a struggle that listing agent Jef Conn says he wasn't entirely
surprised by. "We always hope for the best and plan for the worst.
It's never the best when a contract falls out," Conn said. Conn says
he is working with the City of Littlefield to come up with a plan to get
the detention center sold. "There are some interested parties and we
will be working with them and the city of Littlefield to find the best
possible option and have them come in and buy the prison," Conn said.
For Davis, he is hopeful the detention center can be sold quickly to
alleviate concerns all across the board. "I'm retiring in two weeks,
and I was very hopeful that this would be one problem my successor wouldn't
have to deal with," Davis said.
July 28, 2011 Dallas Morning News
A debt-ridden West Texas town auctioned off the empty prison at the source
of its money problems for $6 million Thursday morning. A private prison
company bought the Bill Clayton Detention Center from the city of
Littlefield, whose approximately 5,700 residents had barely been scraping
by to pay the $9 million they still owed on the facility. The company
placed their offer as a confidential bidder and is requesting to remain
that way until the 30-day period for settling the sale is complete,
according to Jef Conn, a real estate specialist for Coldwell Banker
Commercial Rick Canup Realtors. The five-pod facility was built in 2000 by
hopeful city officials wanting to rake in revenue for the small
cotton-growing town. Instead, Littlefield was saddled with more than $9
million in debt once prisoners were pulled out and the private company
operating the center left. After the sale, Littlefield will only owe
between $3 million and $4 million on the facility, officials said.
July 27, 2011 American Independent
City officials in Littlefield have big hopes for tomorrow morning’s
auction, where a minimum bid of $5 million could be enough to buy your own
little slice of Panhandle heaven: the 383-bed Bill Clayton Detention
Center. It’s being billed as a “turn-key medium security detention center,”
a 383-bed bargain with slick promotions courtesy the Williams and Williams
Worldwide Real Estate Auction house. The 11-year-old prison was refurbished
in 2005, and looks great in the slideshows and teaser trailers produced for
the auction. (Here’s a longer video tour, but scroll down for a look at the
best one, a “Battlestar Galactica” inspired tour, all quick cuts and
drums.) For the City of Littlefield, though, the prison’s last couple years
haven’t been such a thrill ride. The town paid for the prison with a $10
million bond issue, planning for a bright future with the Texas Youth
Commission. But after TYC pulled pulled its charges from the facility in
2003, Littlefield’s credit rating suffered as the South Florida-based
private prison giant GEO Group shopped around the country for inmates to
fill its beds — first with Wyoming’s, then with Idaho’s Department of
Corrections. Idaho pulled its prisoners in 2008, GEO Group after them, and
the town’s been stuck with the empty prison it hasn’t finished paying for.
Now it’s raising taxes and fees on its 6,500 residents to make room for
bond payments. The empty prison is the driving force behind cuts to the
city budget this year, according to a City Manager’s message in the budget:
The budget for 2010-2011 has presented new challenges for us since the debt
payments for the Bill Clayton Detention Center (BCDC) have been pushed
front and center by the lack of a source of prisoners to provide a revenue
stream for those bond payments. Earlier this week, The Bond Buyer looked at
the Bill Clayton facility and a handful of others now sitting empty around
Texas. While many towns found ways to avoid leaving taxpayers on the hook
if operators left, that didn’t happen here: Like many of the speculative
detention centers built in sparsely populated counties, the Clayton
facility was meant to be an economic stimulus instead of an economic drain.
But Littlefield took the somewhat unusual step of pledging its full faith
and credit to the bonds. City officials were either on vacation or didn’t
reply to interview requests from the Independent. The advocacy group
Grassroots Leadership has made a case study of Bill Clayton, warning of the
hidden dangers private prisons can create for a town, and folks with the
group say Texas’ shrinking prison population doesn’t tell the half of the
Littlefield story. “This was like a soap opera,” said Grassroots Leadership
executive director Donna Red Wing, recalling a 2004 prison break police
said was aided by a pair of guards, and a 2008 suicide that sparked a suit
against GEO Group from the family of the inmate, alleging he’d been left in
solitary for more than a year. “You couldn’t make this stuff up, the
stories are horrible,” Red Wing said. “If you wrote that screenplay, they
wouldn’t take it.” When the Idaho DOC left the Clayton facility in 2008,
state Correction Director Brent Reinke said it was pulling out because of
“an ongoing staffing issue,” the Associated Press reported at the time,
referring to an Idaho audit that found guards had been falsifying reports
of their inmate checks. “Littlefield is a difficult place to have a
facility. It’s a long way from an employment base,” said Grassroots
Leadership’s Bob Libal, who edits the blog Texas Prison Bid’ness. Libal
said the Clayton facility was part of a much greater prison-building rush
around Texas that ended around 2007, followed by national searches for
inmates to fill them. The only growth lately, Libal said, has been in
facilities for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. A $35 million prison in
Jones County was built by New Jersey-based Community Education Centers last
summer, and now sits empty, as local TV station KTXS reported, “ready to
bring nearly 200 jobs to the area.” In that case, the county formed a
Public Facility Corporation to help minimize the taxpayers’ liability — but
Libal said it could still mean trouble for the county because its credit
rating is still tied to the prison debt. In January, Littlefield officials
hoped the Texas Department of Criminal Justice would sign off on an
application from Avalon Correctional Services to operate the prison, but
nothing came of it. Now the city just wants it off the books, even at half
of what they paid. NPR featured both the Clayton facility and Jones
County’s new prison back in March, before Littlefield had announced its
auction: “Too many times we’ve seen jails that have got into it and tried
to make it a profitable business to make money off of it and they end up
fallin’ on their face,” says Shannon Herklotz, assistant director of the
[Texas Commission on Jail Standards]. The packages look sweet. A town gets
a new detention center without costing the taxpayers anything. The private
operator finances, constructs and operates an oversized facility. The
contract inmates pay off the debt and generate extra revenue. The economic
model works fine until they can’t find inmates.
July 14, 2011 Willams Auction
This is a unique opportunity to acquire a turn-key medium security
detention center in Littlefield, TX. New owners will benefit from support
from the town that built the facility, the area's low cost of living as
well as a ready local workforce. Conveying with the buildings on auction
day are furniture, linens, computers, kitchen supplies and other equipment
used in the operation of the facility. Located approximately 45 minutes
northwest of Lubbock, it is easily accessible from Highway 84, the
Littlefield Municipal Airport, as well as Preston Smith International
Airport. The Bill Clayton Detention Center was built in 2000 and updated in
2005. Standing on 30+/- acres, the center has 94,437+/- sq ft of space. It
consists of five one-story air-conditioned buildings constructed of
concrete block with a brick veneer and pitch seamed metal roofs. It has a
capacity of 383 inmates in 5 housing pods, complete with dayrooms and other
amenities. The buildings are contained behind a strengthened perimeter of
double fences with an electronic shaker detection system and eight video
surveillance cameras. Approximately 10 acres are contained within the
fence. The facility also has a freestanding gymnasium, maintenance shed,
armory and parking lot. At the opening bid of $5 million, the cost per bed
is approximately $13,055!
May 19, 2011 Bradenton Herald
Fitch Ratings has taken the following action on Littlefield, Texas'
combination tax and revenue certificates of obligation (COs) during the
course of routine surveillance: --$1 million combination tax and revenue
COs, series 1997 affirmed at 'BB+'. -- The Rating Outlook is Negative. --
RATING RATIONALE: --The 'BB+' rating and Negative Outlook reflect the
ongoing financial pressures resulting from Littlefield's challenges in
servicing outstanding debt issued for a now vacant detention center. The
city tapped reserve funds to help make the August 2010 debt service
payments on the series 2000 and 2001 COs (not rated by Fitch); $268,825 was
used from the combined reserves - that money has since been repaid and the
reserves are fully funded. No reserve funds were used to make February 2011
payments. --Despite ongoing efforts to find a new tenant/operator, the
city's detention center remains empty. The city council recently entered
into a contract with an auction company to auction off the facility within
120 days. --Financial resources to make debt service payments have been
aided by the adoption in fall 2010 of a debt service property tax and
transfers from the city's two economic development corporations' sales tax
revenues; transfers from the city's water and wastewater utility fund,
which are secondary pledged revenues for the Series 1997 COs, remain the
main source of debt service support. --General fund finances remain weak,
with limited reserves. -- WHAT COULD TRIGGER A DOWNGRADE A failed auction
would maintain financial pressure on the city, forcing it to continue with
the current practice of cobbling together debt service payment amounts from
various sources; utility system cash levels could decline and additional
reserve fund draws could occur. -- SECURITY: The series 1997 COs are
payable from and secured by a limited ad valorem tax pledge against all
taxable property in the city, plus surplus revenues of the city's
waterworks and sanitary sewer system. -- CREDIT SUMMARY: The city has been
unable to locate a new tenant and/or permanent operator of its detention
facility since the State of Idaho removed its prisoners in January 2009 and
the GEO Group terminated its operating agreement at the same time. With no
facility revenues to service the debt associated with the facility, the
city in subsequent months patched together payments from various city
sources, primarily available revenues of the water and wastewater utility
system. The city was current on its payments until August 2010, when legal
questions surrounding the city's ability to use sales tax revenues from its
4A economic development corporation delayed use of those funds. The city
used nearly $269,000 from the debt service reserves associated with the
series 2000 and 2001 COs issued for the detention center to make the August
2010 payment on these COs. Since then, the legal question regarding use of
economic development corporation sales tax revenues has been resolved
favorably for the city and the debt service reserves were fully
replenished. Also, last fall the city council established a debt service
property tax for the first time, which is expected to generate roughly
$115,000 annually to help meet debt service requirements. Finally,
Littlefield voters last fall approved the creation of a second 4B economic
development corporation (also with sales tax collection authority), and
that corporation's sales tax receipts will supplement the revenue stream.
The combination of sales tax revenues and property tax revenues, a utility
system transfer and a loan of other city funds enabled the city to make the
February 2011 principal and interest payment on the detention center COs
without tapping the reserve funds. Acknowledging the difficulty in securing
new prisoners for the facility, the city recently executed a contract with
a national auction house which will put into motion the process of
auctioning off the detention facility within 120 days. Management reports that
a $5 million reserve (minimum bid) will be included in the bid
specifications. While a sale at this price will not retire the $9.5 million
outstanding in related CO debt, it would enable the city to call a
significant portion of the COs, reduce the annual debt requirement
correspondingly, and relieve the current financial pressure measurably.
Conversely, a failed auction will mean the city continues with its current
practice of piecing together city revenues from various sources to meet
debt payments - a challenging prospect that will keep pressure very high.
Financial flexibility remains limited. The general fund balance is modest,
with the city recording a $17,000 fund balance at fiscal 2010 year-end, or
less than 1% of expenditures and transfers out. While the water and sewer
fund maintains healthy liquidity and has historically provided significant
general fund and detention center fund support, available surplus funds are
expected to decline going forward as excess revenues are used to continue
support of the general fund. The new debt service property tax and
additional sales tax revenues help, but do not eliminate the need for
utility system support. Utility debt service support was budgeted at more
than $390,000 for fiscal 2011, or 50% of the $781,000 annual CO debt
requirement. If the auction fails, reliance on utility system transfers
until the COs are retired does not appear feasible; an alternative
permanent solution would need to be devised. Littlefield, with a population
of nearly 6,400, is located approximately 35 miles northwest of Lubbock and
serves as the county seat for Lamb County. The area is primarily rural in
nature, with agriculture services, government, manufacturing, and trade as
key components of the county's economy. County unemployment rates have
risen, with a 7.6% posted for February 2011; however, the rate remains
below the statewide average of 8.2%. While there is moderate taxpayer
concentration among the top 10 taxpayers, there is generally a good mix of
industries within the list.
March 28, 2011 NPR
Private Prison Promises Leave Texas Towns In Trouble by John Burnett The
country with the highest incarceration rate in the world — the United
States — is supporting a $3 billion private prison industry. In Texas,
where free enterprise meets law and order, there are more for-profit
prisons than any other state. But because of a growing inmate shortage,
some private jails cannot fill empty cells, leaving some towns wishing
they'd never gotten in the prison business. It seemed like a good idea at
the time when the west Texas farming town of Littlefield borrowed $10
million and built the Bill Clayton Detention Center in a cotton field south
of town in 2000. The charmless steel-and-cement-block buildings ringed with
razor wire would provide jobs to keep young people from moving to Lubbock
or Dallas. For eight years, the prison was a good employer. Idaho and
Wyoming paid for prisoners to serve time there. But two years ago, Idaho
pulled out all of its contract inmates because of a budget crunch at home.
There was also a scandal surrounding the suicide of an inmate. Shortly
afterward, the for-profit operator, GEO Group, gave notice that it was
leaving, too. One hundred prison jobs disappeared. The facility has been
empty ever since. A Hard Sell "Maybe ... he'll help us to find
somebody," says Littlefield City Manager Danny Davis good-naturedly
when a reporter shows up for a tour. For sale or contract: a 372-bed,
medium-security prison with double security fences, state-of-the-art control
room, gymnasium, law library, classrooms and five living pods. Davis opens
the gray steel door to a barren cell with bunk beds and stainless-steel
furniture. "You can see the facility here. [It's] pretty austere, but
from what I understand from a prison standpoint, it's better than
most," he says, still trying to close the sale. For the past two
years, Littlefield has had to come up with $65,000 a month to pay the note
on the prison. That's $10 per resident of this little city. A Resident
Burden Is the empty prison a big white elephant for the city of
Littlefield? "Is it something we have that we'd rather not have? Well,
today that would probably be the case," Davis says. To avoid
defaulting on the loan, Littlefield has raised property taxes, increased
water and sewer fees, laid off city employees and held off buying a new
police car. Still, the city's bond rating has tanked. The village elders
drinking coffee at the White Kitchen cafe are not happy about the way
things have turned out. "It was never voted on by the citizens of
Littlefield; [it] is stuck in their craw," says Carl Enloe, retired
from Atmos Energy. "They have to pay for it. And the people who's got
it going are all up and gone and they left us... " "...Holdin'
the bag!" says Tommy Kelton, another Atmos retiree, completing the
sentence. The Declining Prison Population The same thing has happened to
communities across Texas. Once upon a time, it seems every small town
wanted to be a prison town. But the 20-year private prison building boom is
over. Some prisons are struggling outside Texas, too. Hardin, Mont.,
defaulted on its bond payments after trying, so far unsuccessfully, to fill
its 464-bed minimum security prison. And a prison in Huerfano County,
Colo., closed after Arizona pulled out its 700 inmates. According to the
Bureau of Justice Statistics, the total correctional population in the
United States is declining for the first time in three decades. Among the
reasons: The crime rate is falling, sentencing alternatives mean fewer
felons doing hard time and states everywhere are slashing budgets. The
Texas legislature, looking for budget cuts, is contemplating shedding 2,000
contract prison beds. Statewide, more than half of all privately operated
county jail beds are empty, according to figures from the Texas Commission
on Jail Standards. "Too many times we've seen jails that have got into
it and tried to make it a profitable business to make money off of it and
they end up fallin' on their face," says Shannon Herklotz, assistant
director of the commission. The packages look sweet. A town gets a new
detention center without costing the taxpayers anything. The private
operator finances, constructs and operates an oversized facility. The
contract inmates pay off the debt and generate extra revenue. The economic
model works fine until they can't find inmates. In Waco, McLennan County
borrowed $49 million to build an 816-bed jail and charge day rates for bunk
space. But today because of the convict shortage, the fortress east of town
remains more than half empty. The sheriff and county judge, once champions
of the new jail, now decline to comment on it. Former McLennan County
Deputy Rick White, who opposed the jail, had this to say about the prison
developers who put the deal together: "They get the corporations
formed, they get the bonds sold, they get the facility built, their money
is front-loaded, they take their money out. And then there's no reason for
them to support the success of the facility." Two of Texas' busiest
private prison consultants — James Parkey and Herb Bristow — declined
repeated requests for interviews. The Inmate Market Private prison
companies insist their future is sunny. A spokesman for the GEO Group
declined to speak about the Littlefield prison, but he sent along a slew of
press releases highlighting the company's new inmate contracts and prison
expansions across the country. Corrections Corporation of America, the
nation's largest private prison operator, says the demand for its
facilities remains strong, particularly for federal immigration detainees.
New Jersey-based Community Education Centers, which has been pulling out of
unprofitable jails across Texas, issued a statement that "the current
(jail) population fluctuation" is cyclical. One of the places where
CEC is cancelling its contract is Falls County, in central Texas, where a
for-profit jail addition is losing money. Now it's up to Falls County Judge
Steve Sharp to hustle up jailbirds: "If somebody is out there charging
$30 a day for an inmate, we need to charge $28. We really don't have a
choice of not filling those beds," he said. Another place where
they're desperate for inmates is Anson, the little town north of Abilene,
Texas, once famous for its no-dancing law. Today, Jones County owns a
brand-new $34 million prison and an $8 million county jail, both of which
sit empty. The prison developers made their money and left. Then the Texas
Department of Criminal Justice reneged on a contract to fill the new prison
with parole violators. The county's Public Facility Corporation that
borrowed the money to build the lockups owes $314,000 a month — with no
paying inmates. They've got a year's worth of bond service payments set
aside before county officials start to sweat. "The market has changed
nationwide in the last 18 months or two years. It's certainly a different
picture than when we started this project. And so we're continuing to work
the problem," Jones County Judge Dale Spurgin says. Grayson County,
north of Dallas, said no to privatizing its jail. Two years ago, the county
was all set to build a $30 million, 750-bed behemoth twice as big as was
needed. But the public got queasy and county officials ultimately scuttled
the deal. "When you put the profit motive into a private jail, by
design, in order to increase your dollars, your revenues, your profits, you
need more folks in there and they need to stay longer," says Bill
Magers, mayor of the county seat of Sherman, a leading opponent. When the
supply of prison beds exceeds the demand for prison beds, there are beneficiaries.
The overcrowded Harris County Jail in Houston, the nation's third largest,
farms out about 1,000 prisoners to private jails. Littlefield and most
other under-occupied facilities in Texas have all been in touch with
Houston. "It really is a buyer's market right now, especially a county
our size," says Capt. Robin Kinetsky, who is in charge of inmate
processing for the Harris County Sheriffs Department. "They're really
wanting to get our business. So, we're getting good deals." Nearby, disheveled
and unsmiling men are brought from a holding cell to stand before a booking
officer for their intake interviews. The detainees are wholly unaware that
they may soon become the newest commodities of the volatile inmate market.
Aarti Shahani contributed to this NPR News investigation and report.
February 3, 2011 KCBD
While the Lubbock County Detention Center is filling up with inmates, other
counties are struggling to find an inmate. Taxpayers of those counties are
now being held prisoners by their own prisons as they're forced to pay the
price of empty facilities. About an hour from Lubbock, the Bill Clayton
Detention Center in Littlefield hasn't had a single inmate in the last two
years. "This was not built to house local inmates; it was built to
house inmates from other parts of the state or other parts of U.S. It was
built to bring economic development to the city of Littlefield," said
Danny Davis, Littlefield city manager. For a while it did bring money into
Littlefield, until the State of Idaho decided to remove its inmates from
the center when the economy tanked back in 2009. "Everybody was
cutting back it seemed, and it was very difficult to find other inmates
from out of state to come in and fill the facility," said Davis.
Nearly 100 people lost their job in the area, and with $9 million left to
pay for the now empty building, residents are stuck paying the price
through increased taxes and fees." Jokingly I've told people when I
took this job I weighed a lot more and had a lot more hair, so that's how I
guess you can say how the frustration level is. It has been a frustrating
situation for the whole community," said Davis. About two hours away
Dickens County faces a similar fate. Their contractor CEC didn't renew
their contract with the Dickens County Correctional Center. In mid-December
the remaining inmates were moved to Lubbock County's new facility, and
nearly 120 jobs were lost - huge hit to the small communities of Dickens
County. "It cost money to put people in jail. The state of the
economy, the governments don't have as much money. Our own state is cutting
the budget, and there's one way to save money…that's not to incarcerate
them, and so that's why I believe our inmate population is down," said
Lesa Arnold, Dickens County Judge. So far Dickens County hasn't had to
increase taxes to foot the prison's one million dollar bill each year, but
that option might soon surface. "We need to get this thing going
within a year, and hopefully a whole lot sooner than that before that issue
comes up as to who's going to make those bond payments," said Arnold.
So how can Lubbock County fill its newly built facility while these two and
others around the U.S. are failing? It comes down to why these facilities
were built in the first place. Littlefield and Dickens County didn't have
an inmate population for the large prisons they built; instead they were
built to make a profit for the towns by contracting out the prison cells to
other parts of the state and U.S. Lubbock on the other hand, needed the
bigger facility. All 1,063 inmates currently in the Lubbock County
Detention Center are from Lubbock County, which means their cells will
constantly be filled with a local inmate population. The other facilities
are staying hopeful a new inmate population will come their way. "I can't
worry about why we have it because that's in the past. I can only worry
about what can we do with it now that we have it, and that's what we work
on every day," said Davis.
January 3, 2011 Avalanche-Journal
The city of Littlefield comes into 2011 hoping it will have a new tenant
renting the Bill Clayton Detention Center in a few months. The prison,
which closed in January 2009 after the Idaho Department of Corrections
canceled a contract with private operator GEO Group and moved its prisoners
from Littlefield to Oklahoma. Since then, the city has stretched itself
financially to keep making payments on revenue bonds it issues to build the
facility, which opened in 2000 as a juvenile detention center. The present
ray of hope comes with Avalon Correctional Services, which has applied to
TDCJ to operate an Intermediate Sanction Facility, which is a short-term
facility that houses offenders who violate terms of their community
supervision or paroles. The state issued a request for proposals in June,
but no decisions have been made yet. “It’s been on (TDCJ’s) agenda a couple
of times, but reading between the lines, it’s probably waiting until the
state gets a better handle on its budget,” said Danny Davis, Littlefield’s
city manager.
September 1, 2010 Smart Money
Owners of municipal bonds issued to pay for jails might not get to pass
Go--and could have trouble collecting interest payments as well. These tax
free bonds don't have a monopoly on defaults, but they're well represented
among failures and troubled issues among the more speculative classes of
municipal bonds. Data from Municipal Market Advisors reveals a slew of
tax-free bonds issued to fund construction of privately run prisons and
detention facilities in states from Texas to Rhode Island to Montana. The
most recent example is Littlefield, a West Texas town of about 6,500
people. Located between the New Mexico border and Buddy Holly's hometown of
Lubbock, Littlefield had to dip into reserves to cover payments for about
$1.2 in bonds and other debt used to finance the Bill Clayton Detention
Center. The bonds were issued in 2000, but the expected revenue stream
evaporated when, after a prisoner suicide in 2008, the 310-bed private
prison lost its contract to house out-of-state inmates. In 2009, the Geo Group
(GEO), formerly known as Wackenhut Security, ended its operating agreement
with the detention center, leaving it unoccupied. In April, Fitch Ratings,
which in 2009 lowered the bonds to BB from BBB, affirmed a negative rating
outlook. Littlefield city manager Danny Davis says the city is scrambling
to avoid default on the $780,000 worth of annual payments and plans to cut
police and fire service while dramatically raising property taxes when the
new fiscal year begins Oct. 1. The property could be sold or could be taken
over by the state, though neither option is certain. "It's going to be
difficult," he says. "In the meantime, we're just trying to keep
our heads above water until we get to a solution." Bob Libal is the
Texas campaign coordinator for Grassroots Leadership, a lobbying group
which opposes for-profit prisons, and the editor of the blog Texas Prison
Bid'ness. He says many small towns agree to build "speculative
prisons" to be run by private contractors using municipal bond
financing but that many of these projects in a post-Sept. 11 boom have had
trouble. Libal criticizes the development groups that get paid up front for
building detention centers thus saddling the bond-issuers (usually special
public facilities corporations created solely for those projects) with
risky debt. "They go after a lot of towns without a lot of
sophistication and resources to do the due diligence," Libal says.
"If they let the bonds go under, it's very difficult for them to issue
any more debt." Matt Fabian, director of research at Municipal Market
Advisors, cites similar bond woes in Central Falls, R.I.; Hardin, Mont.;
and Baker County, Fla., where about $105 million in total debt has run into
trouble because the prison projects haven't worked out as expected. "The
incarceration rates drives speculation," he says. "There's an
idea that you can profit from this prison trend." Investors in these
increasingly-insecure jail bonds have certainly had to assume more risk,
even though they get higher yields. The $99 million Central Falls Detention
Facility bond issue of 2005 entered technical default in 2009 when it drew
on its reserves to make payments. The bonds, issued at par with a yield of
7.25%, last traded at the end of 2009 at 85.3 cents to the dollar, with a
yield of 8.69%. Municipal revenue bonds issued in 2002 that funded the West
Alabama Youth Services detention facility defaulted in 2005. The bonds last
traded in February at 9 cents to the dollar with a yield of 73.6%. Fabian
says some of the biggest private prison busts are unlikely to have simple
resolutions. A shopping center is easy to repurpose; a detention center is
not. "It's hard to restructure," he says. "Even the land
underneath a prison isn't worth as much as it was." Even with a resurgent
effort by the private prison industry to use their facilities to detain
illegal immigrants and an attempt by the U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement agency to overhaul detention procedures, problems persist. The
Baker Correctional Development Corporation, created to finance a
correctional facility and immigration detention center west of
Jacksonville, Fla., dipped into reserves for its August payment to holders
of bonds issued in 2008. With those bonds trading last at 71.25 cents to
the dollar with a yield of 20.73%, investors looking to lock up their money
should probably seek less risky types of municipal bonds.
June 17, 2010 Courthouse News
A man claims a corrupt private prison company, The GEO Group, bribed the
government to get contracts and then abused inmates, including his father,
who died at the Bill Clayton Detention Center in Littlefield, Texas, from
"grossly inhumane treatment, abuse, neglect, illegal and malicious
conditions of confinement." Daniel McCullough sued Texas-based GEO
Group and its top executives, all of Florida, and the warden of the jail
where his father, Randall, died on Aug. 18, 2008. In his complaint in Comal
County Court, Daniel McCullough says his father "was found dead after
supposedly being monitored by GEO and its personnel." The complaint
states: "McCullough's death was caused by specific breaches of duty by
the Defendants ... who engaged in grossly inhumane treatment, abuse,
neglect, illegal conditions of confinement, and subsequent coverup of
wrongdoings." McCullough claims that "GEO and its personnel were
found to have fabricated evidence, including practicing 'pencil whipping,'
a policy and practice of GEO to destroy and fabricate log books and other
relevant evidence." He claims that GEO and its officers
"personally engage in efforts to illegally influence public officials
in Austin, Texas and in the Texas counties where the GEO prisons are
located, including Laredo, Webb County, Texas. Their goal is to conceal,
deflect, hide or exculpate themselves and their company from all forms of
personal civil or criminal liability, censure, detriment, or punishment in
order to procure and continue their lucrative contracts at the expense of
the inmates' and their families' suffering. They and their company, GEO,
engage in a pattern and practice of abuse, neglect, public corruption, and
cover up." McCullough claims that GEO and its officers "have a
history of illegally neglecting, manipulating, and abusing inmates, and
then covering up their wrongful and illegal conduct." He claims these
abuses include "making illegal payments to governmental entities in
exchange for contracts and permits; ... destruction of evidence and lying
to state investigators; and misrepresentations to state and governmental
entities regarding conditions inside their facilities." He seeks
damages of $595 million - GEO's net worth - for gross negligence, breach of
duty, wrongful death, and pain and suffering. He is represented by Ronald
Rodriguez of Laredo.
April 14, 2010 Business Wire
Fitch Ratings takes the following rating action on Littlefield, Texas'
(the city) as part of its continuous surveillance effort; --Approximately
$1.2 million in outstanding combination tax and revenue certificates of
obligation (COs), series 1997 rated 'BB.' The Rating Outlook remains
Negative. RATING RATIONALE: --The majority of the city's outstanding debt
is for a detention center (not rated by Fitch), which had been
self-supporting from detention center operations. However, both detention
center prisoners and the private operator left the facility in 2009, and
despite the city's active efforts to locate prisoners or sell the facility,
the detention center remains vacant. --The lack of a debt service tax levy
has resulted in considerable operating pressure. --A fully funded debt
service reserve remains in place, with the February 2010 principal and
interest payment made from available funds, primarily excess water and
sewer system revenues. Officials plan to make the next interest payment in
August 2010 from available funds as well, although there is a possibility
debt service reserve funds may be needed. --General fund reserves are
minimal; however, the water and sewer fund maintained about $800,000 in
unrestricted net assets for the close of fiscal 2009. The city is
considering making future detention center debt service payments from a
combination of budget reductions, available city funds, and the imposition
of an interest and sinking fund tax beginning in fiscal 2011. --The city's
tax base has shown moderate annual growth, and county unemployment rates,
although higher than a year ago, remain below the state and nation.
Proximity to the Lubbock metropolitan area offers additional employment
opportunities for residents.
August 24, 2009 Ad Hoc News
Fitch Ratings has downgraded to 'BB' from 'BBB-' the rating on Littlefield,
TX's (the city) outstanding $1.3 million combination tax and revenue
certificates of obligation (COs), series 1997, and removed the ratings from
Rating Watch Negative. The CO's constitute a general obligation of the
city, payable from ad valorem taxes limited to $2.50 per $100 taxable
assessed valuation (TAV). Additionally, the COs are secured by a pledge of
surplus water and sewer revenues. The Rating Outlook is Negative. The
downgrade reflects events related to the operation of the city's detention
center facility, which accounts for the majority of outstanding debt (which
was not rated by Fitch but is on parity with the series 1997 bonds). To the
surprise of city officials, Idaho announced their plans to leave the
Littlefield facility in January 2009, citing the need to consolidate all of
its out-of-state prisoners into a larger facility in Oklahoma. In addition,
the detention center's private operator, the Geo Group, unexpectedly
announced termination of their agreement to manage the facility effective
January 2009. The move to leave Littlefield by the Geo Group is
significant, given that the established private operator had made sizable
equity investments in the detention center reportedly totaling
approximately $2 million. In the past, the ability of the Geo Group to
quickly replace prisoners with little disruption in operations, as well as
their investment in the Littlefield detention center were cited as credit
strengths. On Dec. 9, 2008, Fitch placed the series 1997 bonds on Rating
Watch Negative, reflecting the city's active pursuit of various
alternatives to remedy the situation and possibly resolve it within the
next several months. Funds to repay debt service on detention center COs
through August 2010 had been identified through available city funds as
well as a debt service reserve fund. The city indicated to Fitch in May
2009 that it was in negotiations with another established jail operator
(the operator) to assume management of the Littlefield facility and that
the operator was attempting to secure an agreement with a federal agency to
house prisoners. Resolution or near resolution of this agreement was
expected by August 2009. However, the operator has yet to secure a prisoner
agreement and the timing for resolution remains uncertain. The downgrade to
'BB' reflects the uncertainty as to when and if the city can secure an
operator for the detention center as well as the city's limited financial
resources to repay the detention center debt. While the city continues to pursue
an agreement with the operator (and other private companies in the event
negotiations with the operator break down), the Negative Outlook reflects
the potential financial hardship placed on the city if a long-term viable
solution is not found. Although the detention center COs are also secured
by an ad valorem tax pledge, the city levies a property tax for operations
only. Officials report that the 2010 proposed budget does not include any
property tax levy for debt service, but the city is investigating funding
alternatives for future detention center debt service. In order to fully
support the detention center COs, the ad valorem tax rate would have to
double, which is not politically feasible.
December 13, 2008 Lubbock On-line
GEO Group Inc. says it has canceled its contract with the city of
Littlefield and plans to terminate 74 employees at the Bill Clayton
Detention Center effective Jan. 5 The Boca Raton-based Fla. company gave
official notice last month, filing a mass layoff Worker Adjustment and Retraining
Act letter with the city in accordance with federal law. The letter was
obtained by The Avalanche-Journal. Under the law, an organization
terminating 50 or more employees must give at least 60 days notice. GEO's
decision was made shortly after it learned its own contract had been
canceled with the Idaho Department of Corrections, which according to the
Times-News in Twin Falls, Idaho, cited prisoner safety concerns. IDOC had
contracted with the for-profit corporation to house 300 of its inmates in
the one-time youth detention facility owned by the city. Some of those
inmates, according to the Times-News, will be transferred to the North Fork
Corrections Facility in Sayer, Okla., which is operated by Corrections
Corp. of America. "We understand the gravity of the situation and the
citizens' concerns, but we are working hard toward a solution," said
Danny Davis, Littlefield city manager, who was informed about GEO's
decision on Nov. 7. He said the city has since hired Woodlands-based
Carlisle & Associates, a municipal consultant, which has been brought
on board to sell the 372-bed prison. Littlefield, which issued revenue
bonds to construct the facility as part of an economic development
strategy, still owes $10 million. However, Davis said, the city had already
set aside a year's worth of bond payments as a precautionary measure when
it made the decision to build. "We have enough to make at least the
next three payments," adding the city should not have to tap those
reserve funds until August. Danny Soliz, director of business services for
WorkForce Solutions South Plains - the area's largest job
placement/training organization - said he met with Littlefield prison
guards during 12 hours of informational sessions Wednesday. "We'll be
doing everything we can to help them," he said. Soliz said many of the
workers told him they have no intention of leaving Littlefield, while
others showed interest in applying for jobs at the new Lubbock County Jail
and the Montford Psychiatric Unit operated by the Texas Department of
Criminal Justice. Soliz said WorkForce brought in an expert from Fort Worth
to assist workers in filing for unemployment benefits. Davis said the city
is working on a number of scenarios involving filling the facility with
inmates from other areas on a temporary basis. "We've also talked with
a number of people who are interested in buying it. There are a lot of
entities out there looking for beds, but it takes time for these solutions
to transpire," he said.
December 9, 2008 Yahoo
Fitch Ratings has placed the 'BBB-' rating on Littlefield, TX's (the
city) outstanding $1.4 million combination tax and revenue certificates of
obligation (COs), series 1997 on Rating Watch Negative. The CO's constitute
a general obligation of the city, payable from ad valorem taxes limited to
$2.50 per $100 taxable assessed valuation (TAV). Additionally, the COs are
secured by a pledge of surplus water and sewer revenues. The Negative Watch
reflects recent events related to the operation of the city's detention
center facility, which accounts for the majority of outstanding debt.
Officials are pursuing various alternatives to remedy the situation, with
possible resolution within the next several months. Funds to repay debt
service on detention center COs (which were not rated by Fitch) over the
next one to two years have been identified through available city funds as
well as a debt service reserve fund. However, failure to develop a viable
long-term solution within the near term will have a negative impact on the
rating. Detention center operations support approximately $1.4 million in
outstanding 2000 COs and $9.0 million in outstanding 2001 COs issued for
the construction of the facility. The detention center has a history of
difficulties, beginning with construction delays and the subsequent loss of
Texas Youth Commission (TYC) prisoners in 2003 and State of Wyoming
prisoners in 2006. Detention center operations began to stabilize with the
near immediate replacement of the State of Idaho prisoners in the facility.
The city's contract with Idaho was scheduled to expire in July 2009, with
negotiations for contract renewal planned for January 2009. However, to the
surprise of city officials, Idaho recently announced their plans to leave
the Littlefield facility in January 2009, citing the need to consolidate
all of its out-of-state prisoners into a larger facility in Oklahoma. In
addition, the detention center's private operator, the Geo Group
unexpectedly announced termination of their agreement to manage the
facility effective January 2009. The move to leave Littlefield by the Geo
Group is significant, given that the established private operator had made
sizable equity investments in the detention center reportedly totaling
approximately $2 million. In the past, the ability of the Geo Group to
quickly replace prisoners with little disruption in operations as well as
their investment in the Littlefield detention center were cited as credit
strengths. In response to the sudden loss of both prisoners and operators,
city officials are investigating various options. According to the city, a
number of other jail operators have expressed interest in managing the
Littlefield facility. In addition, officials are considering selling the
facility and retiring the outstanding debt. Officials have expressed the
need to resolve this issue quickly and hope to have additional information
within the next several months. In the interim, officials report that
sufficient funds are on hand to make the Feb. 1 debt service payment, with
the subsequent payments made from other resources, including the water and
sewer fund as well as the debt service reserve fund. Prior to fiscal 2006,
the detention center fund required transfers primarily from the water and
sewer fund to meet operating and debt service needs. Since that time,
detention center net revenues have been sufficient to cover its debt,
providing 1.1 times (x) coverage in fiscal 2007. The water and sewer fund,
which supports the remainder of the city's general obligation debt,
continues to record positive results and for fiscal 2007, net revenues were
$1.4 million, providing more than 3x coverage on water and sewer related CO
debt service. In addition, the series 2000 and 2001 CO sales included
provisions for a fully funded debt service reserve fund. Although the city
utilized the reserve fund to meet debt service requirements in 2001 due to
the delay in opening as well as the moratorium on TYC transfers to the
detention center, officials report that the reserve is currently fully
funded and has not been utilized since 2001 to meet debt service needs. For
fiscal 2007, the restricted reserve stood at $1.1 million compared to
fiscal 2007 debt service of approximately $780,000. Although the detention
COs are also secured by an ad valorem tax pledge, the city levies a
property tax for operations only. Officials report that they are
considering levying a property tax to partially support the detention
center COs. However, in order to fully support the detention center COs,
the tax rate would have to double, which is not feasible given political
realities. Littlefield, with a population of 6,500, is located
approximately 35 miles northwest of Lubbock and serves as the county seat
for Lamb County. The area is primarily rural in nature, with agriculture services,
government, manufacturing, and trade as key components of the county's
economy. The city's population and TAV had been flat until recently; for
fiscal 2008 the city's tax base increased nearly 5% due to the construction
of several commercial projects as well as residential development. While
there is moderate taxpayer concentration among the top 10 taxpayers, there
is generally a good mix of industries within the list. General fund
finances have stabilized over the past several years, benefitting from the
recent imposition of a 0.25% increase in the sales tax rate as well as tax
base growth. Debt ratios are very low given the level of non-property tax
support for outstanding COs although payout is slow. Fitch issued an
exposure draft on July 31, 2008 proposing a recalibration of tax-supported
and water/sewer revenue bond ratings which, if adopted, may result in an
upward revision of this rating (see Fitch research 'Exposure Draft:
Reassessment of the Municipal Ratings Framework'.) At this time, Fitch is
deferring its final determination on municipal recalibration. Fitch will
continue to monitor market and credit conditions, and plans to revisit the
recalibration in first quarter-2009.
November 14, 2008 Magic Valley Times-News
Families of two Idaho inmates who apparently killed themselves in
lockups run by private prison company GEO Group Inc., pleaded Thursday with
Texas state senators to bar out-of-state prisoners from the Lone Star
State. The Idaho Department of Correction has housed more than 300
prisoners at GEO-run Bill Clayton Detention Center in Littlefield, Texas,
but recently announced plans to move them to the private North Fork
Correctional Facility in Sayre, Okla. The move follows allegations that GEO
falsified reports and short-staffed the Texas facility where Idaho inmate
Randall McCullough, 37, died. Families of Idaho inmates spoke Thursday at a
Texas state Senate hearing in Austin, Texas. The hearing, which dealt with
general oversight of the Texas prison system and did not result in specific
action, was webcast live over the Internet. Among those testifying was
lawyer Ronald Rodriguez, who represents McCullough's family as well as that
of Idaho inmate Scott Noble Payne, 43, who killed himself last year at
another GEO-run prison in Dickens, Texas. "Idaho prisoners need to be
in Idaho where they have access to their court - Where they have access to
their families," Rodriguez on Thursday told the Texas Senate Committee
on Criminal Justice. Payne's mother, Shirley Noble, spoke to Texas
lawmakers last year and again on Thursday. "It seems that no lessons
were learned," Noble said. "If changes had been placed - Randall
would not have been so desperate to take his own life, as my son did."
Texas Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, chairman of the Senate Committee on
Criminal Justice, questioned why the "little" state of Idaho
recently decided to pull its prisoners from Geo-run Bill Clayton.
"Should we be following their lead?" he asked. But a Texas
Department of Criminal Justice official told Whitmire that Texas inmates
aren't held at Bill Clayton, and warned against painting private prisons in
Texas with a broad brush. Inmate McCullough's sister, Laurie Williams, told
Texas senators that they should do a review of all private prisons in their
state - including GEO competitor Corrections Corporation of America (CCA).
Idaho prisoners are to be taken to CCA-run North Fork in Oklahoma, where
another Idaho inmate, David Drashner, was allegedly murdered in June.
IDOC's decision to move prisoners from one privately run lockup to another
out-of-state facility concerns Williams, as well as Drashner's wife, Pam
Drashner, who have said they want Idaho to stop shipping away its inmates.
Idaho doesn't have enough room for all its prisoners, and sending them
out-of-state has been widely unpopular. Williams also wants to talk to
Idaho lawmakers, she said. "We should be addressing the Idaho
Senate," said Williams, after Thursday's hearing in Texas. "This
is Idaho sending its inmates out of state whether it's Texas that takes
them or Oklahoma and that's what we have to have stopped." GEO made
$4.9 million in annual operating revenues off its contract with Idaho to
manage prisoners at Bill Clayton. GEO officials said shareholders won't
lose out from Idaho's withdrawal because of an expanding contract with the
state of Indiana.
November 9, 2008 Magic Valley Times-News
Private prison company GEO Group Inc. isn't lamenting the loss of a
multimillion dollar contract with Idaho to manage more than 300 inmates at
a Texas lock-up owned by the city of Littlefield. Idaho was only 1 percent
of Baca Raton-based GEO's business, according to a 2007 annual report from
the company. "The discontinuation of GEO's contract with the Idaho DOC
will have no material impact on GEO's previously issued pro forma earnings
guidance for the fourth quarter of 2008," according to a GEO press
release Friday. GEO made $4.9 million in annual operating revenues off its
contract with Idaho to manage state inmates in Texas, and the company
announced Friday that revenue won't be lost because it's expanding a
contract with the state of Indiana. "GEO expects the discontinuation
of its contract with the Idaho DOC to be more than offset by the 420-bed
contract expansion with the Indiana DOC," according to the press
release. Idaho Department of Correction officials told the Associated Press
Thursday it was pulling out of the contract with GEO and cited inmate
safety risks at the Bill Clayton Detention Center, which is owned by the
city of Littlefield. GEO, however, claims Idaho pulled out of the contract
for a different reason than inmate safety or staffing levels. GEO officials
said Friday that Idaho ended the contract because the state wants to
consolidate all its out-of-state prisoners into one private facility.
"We understand the decision by the state of Idaho to consolidate its
out-of-state inmate population into one large-scale facility," said
GEO Chief Executive Officer George Zoley in the press release. "The
consolidation effort has led to the discontinuation of our out-of-state
inmate contract with the Idaho Department of Correction at the Bill Clayton
Detention Center." IDOC officials told the Times-News Friday that
staffing at Bill Clayton and consolidation efforts were both factors in its
decision to cancel the contract with GEO. IDOC didn't reply to the
Times-News when asked which factor may have weighed more heavily. The
pull-out announced Thursday by IDOC came after a two-month-old audit showed
GEO guards weren't checking on inmates enough. GEO is also terminating its
contract with the city of Littlefield to run Bill Clayton, which it has
operated since 2005, the company announced Friday. GEO decided not to
manage Bill Clayton anymore in Littlefield, a town populated by about 6,500
people, "due to financial underperformance and lack of economies of
scale," according to the Friday press release. The first formal IDOC
audit of Bill Clayton dated Sept. 3 followed an apparent suicide of Idaho
inmate Randall McCullough, 37, of Twin Falls in August. IDOC had been
monitoring the facility at least two weeks out of every month since last
fall, an IDOC official said. IDOC's original two-year contract with GEO
signed in 2006 could have ended on July 20, 2008. IDOC extended it a year
until July 20, 2009, but now says all inmates will be out of Texas by
January and moved to the Northfork Correctional Facility in Sayre, Okla. -
run by GEO competitor, Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), which
holds hundreds of other out-of-state Idaho inmates.
November 7, 2008 The Olympian
Idaho Department of Correction officials still don't know the cause of
death for an inmate who apparently committed suicide in a private Texas
prison in August. But what they do know is disturbing: The prison was so
understaffed that the warden himself was working the midnight shift at the
Bill Clayton Detention Center on Aug. 17, the night Randall McCullough
died. A state investigation found that regularly scheduled checks on
inmates either weren't done or were done incorrectly, and there was no
effective check done on McCullough from the time he turned in his dinner
tray at 5:45 p.m. to the time his body - already cold and stiff - was found
just after midnight. Log books from that night are inaccurate, according to
the investigation, and the videotape from the prison's security system
shows neither the correct date nor the arrival of emergency workers,
prompting Idaho investigators to speculate that it might not be the tape
from that night at all. "You can see where the train wreck is coming,
can't you?" state Department of Correction Chief Investigator Jim
Loucks told The Associated Press in an interview Thursday. Department
officials this week announced they're terminating the state's multimillion
dollar contract with The GEO Group, the for-profit private prison company
that runs the Bill Clayton Detention Center. Within 60 days, the roughly
300 Idaho prisoners there will be transferred to the Correction Corp. of
America-run North Fork Correctional Institution in Sayre, Okla. The inmates
have been housed out of state because of overcrowding in Idaho prisons. As
of Oct. 1, Idaho had nearly 7,300 total inmates. The staff at the Bill
Clayton center - from then-warden Arthur Anderson down to the correctional
officers - didn't follow prison policy or respond properly to McCullough's
death, according to documents obtained by The AP from the Idaho Department
of Correction through public records requests. Pablo Paez, spokesman for
The GEO Group, has not returned repeated phone calls from The AP. The GEO
Group Vice President Amber Martin said she couldn't comment on the
documents or Idaho's decision to end the contract. McCullough was found
dead in his cell by Anderson at about 12:15 a.m., according to the state's
investigation. Two letters were found in his cell as well - one to his
sister, Laurie Williams, and another addressed to Anderson and the Idaho
Department of Correction. "To hom it may concern," the
misspelled, handwritten letter read. "I'v been puting this off for long
anuff. I can't set here and slowly die. Sorry for the inconvenience."
The apparent suicide surprised those who knew McCullough, according to the
investigation. The inmate, who was serving time on a robbery charge, was
within a few months of an expected parole hearing and apparently believed
he would be sent back to Idaho sometime around the end of the year, pending
a cell opening in the state's overcrowded system. McCullough had been in
segregation for several months at the Texas facility after he was accused
of assaulting a staff member. The prison, located in the tiny town of
Littlefield, Texas, competes for employees with nearby oil fields, which
often pay more than residents can make working as a correctional officer,
Loucks said. That contributed to the chronic understaffing. Around the time
McCullough died, prison employees were working as much as 20 hours of
overtime every week, and often resorted to calling in sick just to get some
time off, Loucks said. On the night of Aug. 17, 2008, five people didn't
make it in to work - leaving the prison with just 10 correctional officers
for the 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. shift, below the state-mandated minimum of 12, and
well below the 15 officers generally scheduled, according to the report. To
deal with the shortage, the shift supervisor persuaded two dayshift
employees to stay until 10 p.m., and got two employees scheduled for the
next day to come in four hours early, at 2 a.m. But that still left the
prison short two officers from 10 p.m. on Aug. 17 to 2 a.m. on Aug. 18,
Loucks said. That's when Warden Anderson and Chief of Security Dennis
Blevins agreed to come in to work those middle-of-the night hours. The
short-staffing led to a few bad habits at the prison, according to the
report. Officers often committed a practice known as "pencil-whipping,"
filling out the log books to show they had made security checks on the
inmates every 20 minutes, even if the checks hadn't been done. It also
meant that the prison was often without a utility officer, an employee
charged with fueling the vehicles, emptying the trash and doing other
non-guard duties. Because the segregation unit had fewer inmates than other
areas, the correctional officer guarding the unit was generally pulled away
from his duties to take care of the utility officer chores, Loucks said.
That happened the night of Aug. 17, he said, and as a result no one noticed
that McCullough was unmoving and unresponsive until 12:18 a.m., when Warden
Anderson walked by the cell. Anderson radioed for help when he noticed
McCullough wasn't responding to knocking on the cell door. Medical
personnel came within four minutes, but didn't bring the necessary
equipment to treat an unresponsive patient and so had to go back to another
part of the prison to get it, according to the report. Staffers began CPR,
but didn't move McCullough's body from the bed to the floor, where they
would have had a firmer surface and more effective chest compressions,
investigators found. Prison officials didn't call 911 for 15 minutes,
according to the report, but Anderson reportedly told investigators that
was because he was trying to notify enough other employees so they could
safely unlock McCullough's door and go into the cell. McCullough was dead
and apparently had been for some time - his body was cold to the touch,
according to the report. Prison officials immediately suspected that
McCullough might have overdosed on medication, and his body was sent for
toxicology tests and an autopsy. Those tests have been completed, but the
Texas coroner's report has not yet been finished, so Idaho Department of
Correction officials still don't know just how or why McCullough died. But
one thing is clear: Idaho prisoners will be removed from Bill Clayton.
State Correction Department chief Brent Reinke notes the state prison system
is expanding, with roughly 600 more beds to be added next year. Reinke
hopes that will provide enough room to bring all the out-of-state prisoners
home. "It's a real unfortunate situation - it always is," Reinke
said. "But there's no question that Idaho inmates are much better to
manage in Idaho."
November 6, 2008 AP
The Idaho Department of Correction has terminated its contract with
private prison company The GEO Group and will move the roughly 305 Idaho
inmates currently housed at a GEO-run facility in Texas to a private prison
in Oklahoma. Correction Director Brent Reinke notified GEO officials
Thursday in a letter. Reinke said the company's chronic understaffing at
the Bill Clayton Detention Center in Littlefield, Texas, put Idaho
offenders' safety at risk. An Idaho Department of Correction audit found
that guards routinely falsified reports to show they were checking on
offenders regularly — even though they were sometimes away from their posts
for hours at a time. "I hope you understand how seriously we're taking
not only the report but the safety of our inmates," Reinke told The
Associated Press on Thursday. "They have an ongoing staffing issue
that doesn't appear to be able to be solved." The contract will end
Jan. 5. Reinke said the department wanted to pull the inmates out
immediately, but state attorneys found there wasn't enough cause to allow
the state to break free of the contract without a 60-day warning period. In
the meantime, Reinke said, Idaho correction officials have been sent to the
Texas prison to help with staffing for the next two months. GEO will be
responsible for transferring the inmates to the North Fork Correctional
Facility in Sayer, Okla., which is run by Corrections Corp. of America. GEO
will cover the cost of the move, Reinke said, but Idaho will have to pay
$58 per day per inmate in Oklahoma, compared to $51 per day at Bill
Clayton. Amber Martin, vice president for The GEO Group, of Florida, said
she couldn't comment on the audit or on Idaho's decision to end the
contract. She referred calls to the company spokesman, Pablo Paez, who
could not immediately be reached by the AP. As of Oct. 1, Idaho had nearly
7,300 total inmates. The Bill Clayton audit describes the latest in a
series of problems that Idaho has had with shipping inmates out of state.
Overcrowding at home forced the state to move hundreds of inmates to a
prison in Minnesota in 2005, but space constraints soon uprooted them
again, this time to a GEO-run facility in Newton, Texas. There, guard abuse
and prisoner unrest forced another move to two new GEO facilities: 125
Idaho inmates went to the Dickens County Correctional Center in Spur,
Texas, while 304 went to Bill Clayton in Littlefield. Conditions at Dickens
were left largely unmonitored by Idaho, at least until inmate Scott Noble
Payne committed suicide after complaining of the filthy conditions there.
Idaho investigators looking into Payne's death detailed the poor conditions
and a lack of inmate treatment programs, and the inmates were moved again.
That's when the Idaho Department of Correction created the Virtual Prisons
Program, designed to improve oversight of Idaho inmates housed in contract
beds both in and out of state. The extent of the Bill Clayton facility
understaffing was discovered after Idaho launched an investigation into the
apparent suicide of inmate Randall McCullough in August. During that
investigation, guards at the prison said they were often pulled away from
their regular posts to handle other duties — including taking out the
garbage, refueling vehicles or checking the perimeter fence — and that it
was common practice to fill out the logs as if the required checks of
inmates were being completed as scheduled, said Jim Loucks, chief
investigator for the Idaho Department of Correction. For instance, Loucks
said, correction officers were supposed to check on inmates in the
administrative segregation unit every 30 minutes. But sometimes they were
away from the unit for hours at a time, he said. The investigation into
McCullough's death is not yet complete, department officials said. The
audit also found several other problems at Bill Clayton. The auditor found
that "the facility entrance is a very relaxed checkpoint,"
prompting concerns that cell phones, marijuana and other contraband could
be smuggled past security. In addition, the prison averages a 30 percent
vacancy rate in security staff jobs, according to the audit. Though it was
still able to meet the one-staffer-for-every-48-prisoners ratio set out by
Texas law, employees were regularly expected to work long hours of overtime
and non-security staffers sometimes were used to provide security
supervision, according to the audit. "Based on a review of payroll
reports, there are significant concerns with security staff working
excessive amounts of overtime for long periods of time," the auditors
wrote. "This can lead to compromised facility security practices and
increased safety issues." When the audit was done, there were 29
security staff vacancies, according to the report. That meant each security
staff person who was eligible for overtime worked an average of 21 hours of
overtime a week. That extra expense was borne by GEO, not by Idaho
taxpayers, said Idaho Department of Correction spokesman Jeff Ray. The
state's contract with GEO also required that at least half of the eligible
inmates be given jobs with at least 50 hours of work a month. According to
the facility's inmate payroll report, only 35 out of 371 offenders were
without jobs. But closer inspection showed that the prison often had several
inmates assigned to the same job. In one instance, nine inmates were
assigned to clean showers in one unit of the prison — which only had nine
shower stalls. So although each was responsible for cleaning just one
shower stall, the nine inmates were all claiming 7- and 8-hour work days,
five days a week. GEO is responsible for covering the cost of those wages,
Ray said. "While the contract percentage requirement is met, the
facility cannot demonstrate the actual hours claimed by offenders are spent
in a meaningful, skill-learning job activity," the auditors wrote.
Auditors also found that too few inmates were enrolled in high school
diploma equivalency and work force readiness classes.
October 1, 2008 AP
For a decade, Idaho has been shipping some of its prisoners to
out-of-state prisons, dealing with its ever-burgeoning inmate population by
renting beds in faraway facilities. But now some groups of prisoners are
being brought back home. Idaho Department of Correction officials are
crediting declining crime rates, improved oversight during probation,
better community programs and increased communication between correction
officials and the state's parole board. The number of Idaho inmates has
more than doubled since 1996, reaching a high of 7,467 in May. But in the
months since then, the population has declined to 7,293 -- opening up
enough space that 80 inmates housed in the North Fork Correctional Facility
in Sayre, Okla., and at Bill Clayton Detention Center in Littlefield,
Texas, could be bused back to the Idaho State Correctional Institution near
Boise. The inmates arrived Monday night. Idaho Department of Correction
Director Brent Reinke hailed their arrival as one of the benefits the
system was reaping after years of work. "It's more about having the
right inmates at the right place at the right time," Reinke said.
"People are communicating better and we're working together better
than we were in the past."
September 21, 2008 Times-News
Pam Drashner visited her husband every weekend in prison, until she was
turned away one day because he wasn't there. He had been quietly
transferred from Boise to a private prison in Sayre, Okla. She never saw
him again. In July, she went to the Post Office to pick up his ashes,
mailed home in a box. He died of a traumatic brain injury in Oklahoma,
allegedly assaulted by another inmate. David Drashner was one of hundreds
of male inmates Idaho authorities have sent to private prisons in other
states. About 10 percent of Idaho's inmates are now out-of-state. The
Department of Correction say they want to bring them all home, they simply
have no place to put them. Drashner, who was convicted of repeat drunken
driving, is one of three Idaho inmates who have died in the custody of
private lockups in other states since March 2007, and was the first this
year. On Aug. 18, Twin Falls native Randall McCullough, 37, apparently
killed himself at the Bill Clayton Detention Center in Littlefield, Texas.
McCullough, serving time for robbery, was found dead in his cell. IDOC
officials say he left a note, though autopsy results are pending. His
family says he shouldn't have been in Texas at all. "Idaho should step
up to the plate and bring their prisoners home," said his sister,
Laurie Williams. Out of Idaho -- Idaho has so many prisoners scattered
around the country that the IDOC last year developed the Virtual Prison
Program, assigning 12 officers to monitor the distant prisons. In 2007
Idaho sent 429 inmates to Texas and Oklahoma. This year; more than 700 -
and by one estimate it could soon hit 1,000. But officials say they don't
know exactly how many inmates may hit the road in coming months. The number
may actually fall due to an unexpected drop in total prisoner head-count, a
turnabout attributed to a drop in sentencings, increased paroles and better
success rates for probationers. The state will also have about 1,300 more
beds in Idaho, thanks to additions at existing prisons. State officials say
bringing inmates back is a priority. "If there was any way to not have
inmates out-of-state it would be far, far better," said IDOC Director
Brent Reinke, a former Twin Falls County commissioner, noting higher costs
to the state and inconvenience to inmate families. Still, there's no end in
sight for virtual prisons, which have few fans in state government. "I
do think sending inmates out-of-state is counter-productive," said
Rep. Nicole LeFavour, D-Boise, a member of the House Judiciary, Rules and
Administration Committee. LeFavour favors treatment facilities over
prisons. "We try to make it (sending inmates out-of-state) a last
resort, but I don't think we're doing enough." Even lawmakers who
favor buying more cells would like to avoid virtual lockups. "It's
more productive to be in-state," said Sen. Denton Darrington, R-Declo,
chairman of the Senate Judiciary and Rules Committee, who said he would
support a new Idaho prison modeled after the state-owned but privately run
Idaho Correctional Center (ICC). "We don't want to stay out-of-state
unless we have to ��- It's
undesirable." A decade of movement -- Idaho has shipped inmates
elsewhere for more than a decade, though in some years they were all
brought home when beds became available at four of Idaho's state prisons.
The 1,500-bed ICC - a state-owned lockup built and run by CCA (Corrections
Corporation of America) - also opened in 2000. But that wasn't enough:
"It will be years before a substantial increase in prison capacity
will allow IDOC to bring inmates back," the agency said in April. In
2005, former IDOC director Tom Beauclair warned lawmakers that "if we
delay building the next prison, we'll have to remain out-of-state longer
with more inmates," according to an IDOC press release. That year
inmates were taken to a Minnesota prison operated by CCA, where Idaho paid
$5 per inmate, per day more than it costs to keep inmates in its own
prisons. "This move creates burdens for our state fiscally, and can
harden our prison system, but it's what we must do," IDOC said at the
time. "Our ability to stretch the system is over." Attempts to
add to that system have largely failed. Earlier this year Gov. C.L.
"Butch" Otter asked lawmakers for $191 million in bond authority
to buy a new 1,500-bed lockup. The Legislature rejected his request, but
did approve those 1,300 new beds at existing facilities. Reinke said IDOC
won't ask for a new prison when the next Legislative session convenes in
January. With a slow economy and a drop in inmate numbers, it's not the
time to push for a new prison, he said. Still, recent projections for IDOC
show that without more prison beds here, 43 percent of all Idaho inmates
could be sent out-of-state in 2017. "It's a lot of money to go
out-of-state," Darrington said. Different cultures -- One of eight
prisons in Idaho is run by a private company, as are those housing Idaho
inmates in Texas and Oklahoma. The Bill Clayton Detention Center in Texas
is operated by the Geo Group Inc., which is managing or developing 64
lockups in the U.S., Australia and South Africa. The North-Fork
Correctional Facility in Oklahoma is owned and operated by CCA, which also
has the contract to run the Idaho Correction Center. CCA houses almost
75,000 inmates and detainees in 66 facilities under various state and
federal contracts. Critics of private prisons say the operators boost
profits by skimping on programs, staff, and services. Idaho authorities
acknowledge the prisons make money, but consider them well-run.
"Private prisons are just that - business run," Idaho Virtual Prison
Program Warden Randy Blades told the Times-News. "It doesn't mean
out-of-sight, or out-of-mind." Yet even Reinke added that "I
think there's a difference. Do we want there to be? No." The
Association of Private Correctional and Treatment Organizations (APCTO) says
on its Web site that its members "deliver reduced costs, high quality,
and enhanced accountability." Falling short? Thomas Aragon, a
convicted thief from Nampa, was shipped to three different Texas prisons in
two years. He said prisons there did little to rehabilitate him, though
he's up for parole next year. "I'm a five-time felon, all grand theft
and possession of stolen property," said Aragon, by telephone from the
ICC. "Apparently I have a problem and need to find out why I steal.
The judge said I needed counseling and that I'd get it, and I have yet to
get any." State officials said virtual prisons have a different
culture, but are adapting to Idaho standards. "We're taking the
footprint of Idaho and putting it into facilities out-of-state,"
Blades said. Aragon, 39, says more programs are available in Idaho compared
to the Texas facilities where he was. Like Aragon, almost 70 percent of
Idaho inmates sent to prison in 2006 and 2007 were recidivists - repeat
IDOC offenders - according agency annual reports. GEO and CCA referred
questions about recidivism to APCTO, which says only that its members
reduce the rate of growth of public spending. Aragon said there weren't
enough case-workers, teachers, programs, recreational activities and jobs
in Texas. Comparisons between public and private prisons are made difficult
because private companies didn't readily offer numbers for profits,
recidivism, salaries and inmate-officer ratios. During recent visits to the
Bill Clayton Detention Center in Littlefield, Texas - where about 371 Idaho
inmates are now held - state inspectors found there wasn't a legal aid
staffer to give inmates access to courts, as required by the state
contract. Virtual Prison monitors also agreed with Aragon's assessment:
"No programs are offered at the facility," a state official wrote
in a recently redacted Idaho Virtual Prison report obtained by the
Times-News. "Most jobs have to do with keeping the facility clean and
appear to be less meaningful. This creates a shortage of productive time with
the inmates. "Overall, recreational activities are very sparse within
the facility ��- Informal
attempts have been made to encourage the facility to increase offender
activities that would in the long run ease some of the boredom that IDOC
inmates are experiencing," according to a Virtual Prison report. The
prison has since made improvements, the state said. Only one inmate case
manager worked at Bill Clayton during a recent state visit, but the
facility did increase recreation time and implemented in-cell hobby craft
programs, Virtual Prison reports show. Other inmate complaints have grown
from the way they have been sent to the prisons. Inmates describe a
horrific bus ride from Idaho to Oklahoma in April in complaints collected
by the American Civil Liberties Union in Boise. The inmates say they
endured painful and injurious wrist and ankle shackling, dangerous driving,
infrequent access to an unsanitary restroom and dehydration during the
almost 30-hour trip. "We're still receiving a lot of complaints, some
of them are based on retaliatory transfers," said ACLU lawyer Lea
Cooper. IDOC officials acknowledge that they have also received complaints
about access to restrooms during the long bus rides, but they maintain that
most of the inmates want to go out-of-state. Many are sex offenders who
prefer the anonymity associated with being out-of-state, they said.
Unanswered questions -- Three deaths of Idaho interstate inmates in 18
months have left families concerned that even more prisoners will come home
in ashes. "We're very disturbed about...the rate of Idaho prisoner
deaths for out-of-state inmates," Cooper said. It was the razor-blade
suicide of sex-offender Scott Noble Payne, 43, in March 2007 at a Geo
lockup in Dickens, Texas that caught the attention of state officials.
Noble's death prompted Idaho to pull all its inmates from the Geo prison.
State officials found the facility was in terrible condition, but they
continue to work with Geo, which houses 371 Idaho inmates in Littlefield,
Texas, where McCullough apparently killed himself. Noble allegedly escaped
before he was caught and killed himself. Inmate Aragon said he as there,
and that Noble was hog-tied and groaned in pain while guards warned other
inmates they would face the same if they tried to escape. Private prison
operators don't have to tell governments everything about the deaths at
facilities they run. The state isn't allowed access to Geo's mortality and
morbidity reports under terms of a contract. Idaho sent additional inmates
to the Corrections Corporation of America-run Oklahoma prison after
Drashner's husband died in June. IDOC officials said an Idaho official was
inspecting the facility when he was found. IDOC has offered few details
about the death. "The murder happened in Oklahoma," said IDOC
spokesman Jeff Ray, adding it will be up to Oklahoma authorities to charge.
Drashner said her husband had a pending civil case in Idaho and shouldn't
have been shipped out-of-state. She says Idaho and Oklahoma authorities
told her David was assaulted by another inmate after he verbally defended
an officer at the Oklahoma prison. Officers realized something was wrong
when he didn't stand up for a count, Drashner said. "He was healthy.
He wouldn't have been killed over here," she said.
August 28, 2008 Times-News
An Idaho prison inmate held at a private facility in Texas through the
state's Virtual Prison Program was in solitary confinement for more than a
year when he apparently killed himself, authorities have confirmed. Idaho
Department of Correction is still investigating the cause and manner of
death for the inmate, Randall McCullough, 37, who was found unresponsive
Aug. 18 in his cell, which measured 7.5 feet, by 12 feet, by 8 feet, said
Idaho Department of Correction Spokesman Jeff Ray. McCullough had been
segregated from other inmates since Dec. 13, 2007, after he allegedly
assaulted a staff member at the Bill Clayton Detention Center run by Geo
Group Inc., said Ray. He apparently wasn't criminally charged for that
alleged assault in Texas. "It's our understanding that the prosecutor
in Texas had not made a decision on whether or not to file charges,"
said Ray. "The staff assault occurred in Texas and would be considered
a Texas crime. IDOC would not have a direct connection to it."
Authorities at Geo Group's Bill Clayton Detention Center directed all
questions from the Times-News on Wednesday back to the Idaho Department of
Corrections. McCullough was in prison for a 2001 Twin Falls County robbery
conviction. He had a criminal record involving charges of escape, forgery,
controlled substance possession, grand theft, burglary, resisting arrest,
and driving violations, according to court records. Imposing inmate
segregation for one to two years as a result of an assault on a guard would
not be uncommon, and wardens at out-of-state facilities holding Idaho
inmates can decide if an inmate is put in segregation, said Ray. Inmates in
segregation eat meals in their cells and can shower once every 72 hours.
Toilets are in cells and McCullough had a television, said Ray. Lights at
the Texas facility are on 24 hours a day, Ray said, adding that some
facilities in Idaho dim lights at sleeping times.
August 21, 2008 The Times News
The state's Virtual Prison Program is only a year old and the Monday
death of inmate Randall McCullough, 37, could be the second suicide
involving the initiative outside of Idaho. Idaho prison officials said
Wednesday they're still investigating if McCullough committed suicide at a
private contracted facility in Texas - Bill Clayton Detention Center run by
the GEO Group Inc. - which is holding 371 inmates each at $51 per day under
a contract that expires in July 2009. The Virtual Prison Program started in
July 2007, but the state started putting inmates in non-state owned
facilities in October 2005, said Idaho Department of Correction Spokesman
Jeff Ray. Six state inmates have committed suicide since July 2006, not
including McCullough, Ray said.
December 11, 2007 AP
Inmates from Idaho housed at a private West Texas detention facility could
face new charges following an attack on a female guard. The woman was
attacked about 7:30 p.m. Monday after she apparently tried to take tobacco
away from at least two of the inmates at the Bill Clayton Detention Center,
Idaho Department of Correction spokesman Jeff Ray said. The woman suffered
non-life threatening injuries, he said. Afterward, as many as 15 inmates
refused to return to their cells and additional officers were called in to
help, Ray said. The inmates then agreed to return to their cells, he said.
Officials with the Littlefield police department, which is investigating
the incident, did not immediately return a phone call Tuesday. A deputy
warden with the Idaho agency is on his way to Littlefield to investigate, a
release from that department said. Those involved in the attack could face
charges, and inmates who refused to return to their cells will likely face
disciplinary sanctions, the release said. The prison is operated by The GEO
Group Inc., a Boca Raton, Fla.-based company that owns or operates 68
facilities worldwide. "We will be working cooperatively with the Idaho
Department of Correction as they conduct their investigation," said
Pablo Paez, a GEO spokesman. A lack of space in Idaho prisons brought
hundreds of inmates to Texas in early 2006. They were first housed here at
a GEO facility in Newton in East Texas. They were moved to Littlefield in
August 2006 after allegations of abuse by guards prompted an investigation.
Three employees at Newton's facility were disciplined as a result of the
investigation.
July 31, 2007 Idaho Statesman
Idaho's Department of Correction has created a new position to manage
Idaho's roughly 2,400 inmates in private, out-of-state prisons and county
jail beds. Randy Blades, who has been the warden at the Idaho State
Correctional Institution south of Boise, will monitor the 500-plus inmates,
now in three Texas prisons managed by the Geo Group Inc. of Boca Raton,
Fla. He will also monitor the 240 inmates soon to be transferred from Idaho
to a private prison in Oklahoma, and the inmates in county jail beds across
the state. Correction Director Brent Reinke created the position after
disclosing that conditions at one of those prisons were so bad that inmates
will be moved elsewhere. Inmates at the Dickens County Correctional Center
are being moved to the Bill Clayton Detention Center after an inmate
suicide at Dickens revealed filthy living conditions and poorly trained and
unprofessional staff. “Times have changed and we simply need to get in
front on this issue,” Reinke said in a statement. “We must be proactive. We
need to make sure inmates are being treated adequately and taxpayers are
getting what they are paying for.”
October 24, 2006 Yahoo.com
Fitch downgrades the rating on Littlefield, TX's (the city) outstanding
$1.6 million combination tax and revenue certificates of obligation (COs),
series 1997 to 'BB+' from 'BBB+.' The Rating Outlook is Stable. The
downgrade primarily reflects the city's significantly weakened financial
position. The general fund balance has been at minimal levels for the past
several years, while the detention center fund, which supports the bulk of
the city's general obligation debt, is in a deficit unrestricted net asset
position, created by the pull-out of Texas Youth Commission (TYC) prisoners
in 2003. Some signs of financial improvement are evident, and projected
fiscal 2006 results are expected to show a moderate increase in general
fund reserve levels as well as a small operating surplus in the detention
center fund. Further, the detention center is now fully occupied.
Nevertheless, financial stabilization has not been achieved, and the city
remains highly dependent on housing outside prisoners to meet operational
and debt service requirements of the detention center. Detention center
operations, which experienced problems at the onset primarily due to
construction delays, were again negatively impacted by the loss of all TYC
prisoners in 2003. While TYC offenders were subsequently replaced with
state of Wyoming prisoners, the impact on finances was severe and continued
through fiscal 2005, evidenced by a $351,000 unrestricted net asset deficit
recorded in the detention center fund. In addition, the detention center
fund had to rely on support from other funds, most notably a sizable
transfer from the water and sewer fund in fiscal 2004, to meet operational
and debt service needs. The contract to house Wyoming prisoners was
terminated in 2006, and subsequently a new contract with the state of Idaho
was implemented. For 2006, officials report that no outside financial
support was required and that a $30,000 operating surplus is expected.
However, the large deficit will likely remain for sometime and the
historical movement of prisoners in and out of the Littlefield facility
demonstrates the difficulty of maintaining long-term prisoner contracts. If
the city had to levy an interest and sinking fund tax to meet detention
center related debt obligations, officials estimate that the overall tax
rate would have to double over the current operations and maintenance tax
rate, which Fitch believes would be extremely difficult to impose.
Blackwater Correctional
Facility, Milton, Florida
FBI issues subpoenas apparently linked to
Florida Geo Group investigation, June 16, 2011. As previously reported by
DBA Press (“Legacy of Corruption,” February, 2011), the Federal Bureau of
Investigation has been quietly investigating the circumstances which led to
the appropriation and construction of Florida’s largest private prison,
Blackwater River Correctional Facility (Blackwater CF), operated by
Florida-based private prison operator, Geo Group. By Beau Hodai DBA
Press
New private prison in Milton shows
Florida cost-savings challenge, April 25, 2011,
Steve Bousquet, Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau. Excellent piece
exposing the cherry-picking going on in this GEO for-profit prison.
DBA Press Investigative Report: Legacy of
Corruption January 22, 2011
U.S. Senator Marco Rubio’s unsettling history of extremely close ties to
private prison operator Geo Group and the possible federal investigation
into Florida’s private prison giveaway of more than $120 million. By Beau
Hodai
Mar 20, 2019 pnj.com
Santa Rosa County inmate indicted for the murder of fellow inmate
An inmate at
Blackwater Correctional Institution in Milton was indicted by a Santa Rosa
County grand jury for first-degree premeditated murder. Thomas H. Fletcher
was indicted for allegedly killing fellow inmate Kenneth J. Davis, State
Attorney Bill Eddins announced Tuesday morning, adding that the state has
filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty in its case. The
indictment comes nearly six months after Davis was found unresponsive at
the private prison around 3 p.m. on Sept. 22, 2018. At 3:33 p.m., EMS
confirmed Davis' death. Davis, 33, was serving 25 years for attempted
first-degree murder in Walton County. Fletcher was serving a sentence for
convictions in Broward County for murder, robbery and trafficking cocaine
in 1994. Fletcher is next scheduled to appear in court on March 28 in Santa
Rosa County.
Sep 28, 2018 pnj.com
Authorities investigating inmate death at Blackwater River Correctional
Authorities are investigating an inmate death at Blackwater River
Correctional Institution. Inmate Kenneth Davis died at the private prison
Saturday, though Blackwater CI officials were not available for comment
Monday afternoon. Florida Department of Law Enforcement spokesman Jeremy
Burns confirmed the agency is involved in the investigation but could not
comment further, citing the active nature of the case. Florida Department
of Corrections records show Davis, 33, was serving 25 years for attempted
first-degree murder in Walton County.
Jan 12, 2018 nwfdailynews.com
Corrections officer stabbed at private prison
MILTON — A corrections officer at Blackwater River Correctional
Facility was stabbed by an inmate Tuesday morning. “She’s going to be
fine,” said state Sen. Doug Broxson, whose district houses the prison. The
assault occurred at 8:40 a.m. during a “routine post assignment,” according
to a statement released Thursday by The Geo Group, the private organization
that runs the Blackwater River prison east of Milton. “The officer received
immediate medical attention and was transported to an area medical
facility. The incident was referred to law enforcement and remains under
ongoing investigation,” the release said. Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob
Johnson said his agency had not been contacted to investigate the stabbing.
Dexter McWhite, 56, who is serving a life sentence for aggravated assault,
robbery and armed robbery, attacked the officer, according to The GEO
Group. The GEO Group did not release the identity of the victim, whose
injury was not life-threatening. The prison has been on lockdown since
Tuesday, an inmate’s family member said. It remained locked down Thursday
evening, according to the prison staff. Questions about the stabbing were
deflected by the Florida Department of Corrections to the state Department
of Management Services. The DOC said Managment Services has oversight of
private prisons. In a late afternoon email, a Management Services
spokeswoman said The GEO Group would respond to all questions about the
stabbing. Blackwater River administrators also directed questions to The
GEO Group. Broxson finally stepped in late in the day to break the
gridlock. He said he had communicated to officials at the state agencies
and Blackwater the need for future transparency. “I encouraged the
departments to be more open in the process,” he said.
December 1, 2011 The Daily News
Santa Rosa County Commissioner Bob Cole said Thursday that FBI agents had
asked him Wednesday about a private land sale in 2009 and the county’s sale
of land to build the Blackwater River Correctional Facility in Milton. “It
was all the same things over again,” Cole said during a brief telephone
conversation about the search of his home and business. “They threw so much
out there I didn’t know what they were focused on.” FBI and IRS agents
searched Cole’s home in East Milton and his Pensacola business, Bob Cole’s
Automotive. No arrests were made and the agents declined to say what they
were seeking. Cole, who has been a commissioner since 2002, has maintained
his innocence of any wrongdoing. Although his County Commission offices
were not searched Wednesday, Cole focused his comments on his actions as an
elected official. “No vote was bought and I did not better myself because
of a vote,” he said Wednesday. “I am comfortable in my votes of the past on
issues and no one twisted my arm. Everything I have done is on the record
and I feel good to go.” Cole confirmed Thursday that agents asked
specifically about his sale of land to a business known as Beannacht
Properties LLC. On April 17, 2009, Cole sold 9 percent of a five-acre
parcel on Welcome Church Road to Beannacht Properties for about $50,000.
Beannacht Properties is managed by Nina Roche Cobb and her husband, Donald
Cobb. Nina Roche Cobb is the daughter of John and Deborah Roche, Gulf
Breeze residents who own Lifeguard Ambulance Service, which holds a
contract with Santa Rosa County to provide emergency services. A federal
warrant was issued in August for documents pertaining to several Santa Rosa
County land transactions and material related to discussions regarding the
county’s Lifeguard Ambulance contract. It is not clear whether the records
request in August and Wednesday’s search of Cole’s home and business are
related. Calls to Beannacht Properties have not been returned. Cole also
acknowledged Thursday that the FBI has also asked him about the county’s
$2.65 million sale of land to a south Florida company known as the GEO
Group. The GEO Group bought the property so that it could build a $120
million private prison in Milton.
September 25, 2011 Pensacola News Journal
Two Santa Rosa County officials are due at Pensacola's federal courthouse
on Tuesday — with volumes of records — to answer four federal subpoenas
served in August. Cindy Anderson, executive director of the TEAM Santa Rosa
Economic Development Council, and Santa Rosa County Attorney Angela Jones
will present thousands of pages of documents as well as numerous digital
files to the federal grand jury. TEAM and the county each received two
subpoenas in August demanding records involving contracts, developments,
land purchases, travel and other interactions among TEAM, the county and
numerous private parties. The FBI and the U.S. Attorney's Office won't say
why they want the information. The subpoenas sought information about a
wide range of topics: » Santa Rosa County's purchase of an industrial park
from Navarre developer Bill Pullum in 2009. » Any County Commission or TEAM
staff member's travel to Pullum's private island in Honduras. » Any County
Commission or TEAM staff member's travel to Washington, D.C. » Any county
business with Pullum, developer Garrett Walton, architect and former state
Sen. Charlie Clary, and Okaloosa County businessman William McElvy. » The
sale of any property between the county and James "Jim" Young
and/or KWY Investments, the company that sold the property where the
private Blackwater River Correctional Institute came to be built in East
Milton. » The county's ambulance service contract. Subpoenas issued to
other offices center around how Blackwater River Correctional Institute
came to be built by the Boca Raton-based GEO Group and the nature of former
state Rep. Ray Sansom's relationship to the project.
September 1, 2011 Gulf Breeze News
A Grand Jury will meet in Pensacola on Sept. 27 to start reviewing
numerous boxes of documents from Santa Rosa County’s economic development
deals dating back to 2002. Subpoenas from the Federal Bureau of
Investigation were served on the County Commissioners and on the county’s
economic development arm, TEAM Santa Rosa, last Tuesday, Aug. 23.
Commission chairman Lane Lynchard and TEAM Santa Rosa Director Cindy
Anderson each said they are looking at this as an opportunity to clear the
record – and the air – on these projects once and for all. “Anytime you
receive a federal subpoena of any kind, it puts the county in a negative
light. There is no doubt about that,” said Lynchard, an attorney from Gulf
Breeze. “But it is my understanding this is the first federal subpoena of
any kind that has been received by Santa Rosa County, and I really look at
this as an opportunity to set the record straight on any questions
concerning our economic development dealings. “The records they wanted go
back as far as 2002 from the County Commission. I know there were a lot of
questions surrounding the purchase of the property in 2009 for the
industrial park off Interstate 10 and U.S. Highway 90. Maybe this can out
those questions to rest once and for all.” Anderson said most of the
records subpoenaed already have been looked at and found to have no
problems by the State Attorney’s Office as well as the Ethics Committee.
“This really all started back when the ID Group of Gulf Breeze got funding
from some grants back in 2004,” Anderson said. “There has been a group of
individuals who have had questions on several projects since then, and I
really hope this latest review of all those records can put all the
questions to rest. “The investigation in March when records were subpoenaed
was concerning only the private GEO prison project. Now this latest request
has to do with any and all of our records going all the way back to at
least 2004. That is boxes and boxes of records.” The owner of the ID Group
was a former member of the TEAM Santa Rosa Board, and when TEAM received a
$170,000 Defense grant, the TEAM board hired the ID Group to do the work
required by the grant. Former State Rep. Ray Sansom was tied to the GEO
group from Boca Raton that built the private Blackwater River Correctional
Institute in East Milton last year. Questions have centered on Sansom’s
involvement with the GEO group in Boca Raton since 2008, when the group
purchased the property for the Milton prison. Subpoenas in March requested
any and all records concerning that prison project.
August 24, 2011 Pensacola News-Journal
A federal grand jury in Pensacola is investigating the building and funding
of a privately owned correctional facility that opened last year in East
Milton, including the role of former state Rep. Ray Sansom. On Tuesday, the
FBI seized a computer used by Santa Rosa County Commissioner Jim Melvin and
his predecessor, Gordon Goodin. Melvin, who took office last year, said FBI
agents told him the investigation was not focused on him but did not
disclose what they were interested in. Goodin, who served for eight years,
said he was confident the investigation didn't involve him. During the past
five months, the grand jury, working with the FBI, has issued three other
subpoenas. The first subpoena on March 29 requested that TEAM Santa Rosa,
the county's economic development agency, deliver all records pertaining to
Project Justice, the code name for the ultimately successful effort to
bring a private prison operated by the Boca Raton-based Geo Group to the
county. The Blackwater River Correctional Institute, owned by Geo under a
contract with the state, opened last year. It is designed for 2,200
high-security prisoners. The March subpoena ordered Team Santa Rosa to
produce all records related to "the projection, planning, design,
funding, appropriation, construction and/or operation of any privately
owned correctional facility located in Santa Rosa County." The second
subpoena to Florida's Office of Legislative Services, dated May 27,
requested travel vouchers since January 2004 for Sansom and several of his
aides. The third subpoena, with the same date, was addressed to former
Sansom aide Samantha Sullivan of Mary Esther. It ordered records
"pertaining to any function performed as a legislative aide to state
Rep. Ray Sansom" since Jan. 1, 2002. On March 27, 2008, Sansom
traveled to Boca Raton on what he described in a travel voucher as
"personal business after Session 2008." On April 4, Sansom
inserted a provision into the 2008-09 general appropriation bill for $110
million for an addition to the Graceville Correctional Institute, owned by
Geo, in Jackson County. That appropriation was removed. Then, on April 8,
Sansom substituted an appropriation of $110 million into the 2008-09 state
budget for a private prison to be built anywhere in the state, with no
reference to Graceville. That money went to the East Milton facility, which
ended up costing $140 million. In February 2010, Sansom, while serving as
speaker of the House, resigned amid criminal allegations that he inserted a
$6 million appropriation into the state budget for construction of an
aircraft hangar in Destin for a prominent Florida Republican Party
contributor, Jay Odom. The state dropped its case against Sansom in March
after a Tallahassee judge blocked key prosecution testimony. Santa Rosa
officials reached Tuesday said they didn't know the reason for the seizure
of the commission computer. Commissioner Lane Lynchard said he learned of
the seizure from Santa Rosa County Attorney Angela Jones but didn't know
what the FBI's interest was. He said the county was served with two federal
grand jury subpoenas, but he didn't know what the other one involved. Jones
was not in her office Tuesday afternoon, and county spokeswoman Joy
Tsubooka said copies of the subpoenas would not be available until today.
Melvin said the federal agents appeared in his office with two subpoenas at
about 10 a.m. "They explained that they had no problems with me, but
that they needed records from the computer in my office," Melvin said.
"They wanted to know whether I would demand a court order. I told them
I was not the custodian of those records. They met with the county
attorney, and then came and removed the computer from my office."
Melvin said he did not know the nature of the records sought. Goodin, who
was recently cleared of an ethics complaint involving a 2005 trip he and
his wife took to Central America, said he had "no idea" what
interest the FBI would have in the computer. "I'm not worried about
any more investigations," he said. "They can investigate whatever
they want." A message left at the FBI office in Pensacola was not
returned Tuesday.
June 17, 2011 WEAR TV
"This is the $120 million Blackwater River Correctional Facility. It's
been a pretty quiet addition to East Santa Rosa County, bringing hundreds
of new jobs here. But... the Federal Government is continuing wide-scale
investigation into what led to the construction of this prison." The
project has been under fire ever since it became public knowledge. The GEO
Group... The company that now runs the prison... Has documented ties to
several state lawmakers who help approve the 120 million dollar project.
Jerry Couey is one of many people around the state that's been closely
following the development of this prison for years. "Any citizen or
private business owner would love to have the same deal. I don't understand
how they got the deal and I've become very curious about how that
occurred." Jerry is not alone. The FBI obtained this subpoena in
federal court back at the end of march. In it... The US District Court for
the Northern District of Florida demands team Santa Rosa turn over all it's
paperwork related to the GEO group and the state lawmakers who backed the
privatized prison project in the legislature. , "I wish them well in
their search. I think they're on to something that certainly needs to be
looked at, in a time in the state of Florida where dollars are so precious,
how did this happen." "It would make sense for them to come to
us, because they know we have to keep track of all of this and it would be
packaged all together all in one place." "The FBI is very good at
what they do, and I don't know what's going to come of it. My gut gives me
concern about how it occurred."
August 16, 2010 Sunshine State News
Former Rep. Loranne Ausley, the Democratic nominee to be the next state
CFO, attacked a program backed by her Republican rival, Senate President
Jeff Atwater of North Palm Beach, that slashed 71 prison work squads, which
she insisted saved Florida taxpayers more than $35 million, and created a
new private prison. Labeling the Blackwater River Correctional Institution
the “prison to nowhere,” Ausley noted that the project had already cost the
state more than $110 million and that Atwater was ignoring recommendations
made by the Florida Department of Corrections. She also compared the
project to a new courthouse in Tallahassee which she labeled the
“Tallahassee Taj Mahal.” “Senate President Jeff Atwater’s ‘prison to
nowhere’ is yet another product of the broken system in Tallahassee, and
once again Florida taxpayers are stuck with the bill,” said Ausley.
“Floridians are fed up with politicians who play by their own rules with
our money. Whether it’s the ‘Tallahassee Taj Mahal,’ the ‘Prison to
Nowhere’ or an airport hanger for a political contributor, politicians in
Tallahassee need to be held accountable.”
August 10, 2010 WCTV
Prison work squads are as old prisons themselves. But the state has slashed
the number of work squads since the new budget took effect in July.
Motorist Toby Edwards doesn’t think that’s good for roadways or the
prisoners. “They eat good and the state takes care of them but that’s
coming from the taxpayers,” Edwards said. “So they should be the ones out
there picking up the trash.” Another motorist, Steve Bedosky thinks the
work should be contracted to private companies. “I’ve never really been in
favor of taking those jobs away from the private sector and putting
prisoners out there at a lower price,” Bedosky said. But local governments
don’t have the resources, which means the work will often go undone. 71
crews like this one are being cut. That’s going to mean taller grass, more
trash on the road, and costs being shifted. The Department of Corrections
was forced by lawmakers to spend 24 million dollars opening a private
prison orchestrated by disgraced former speaker Ray Sansom. The private
prison took money from the work squads, even though new projections show
the 2200 private prison beds weren’t needed. The union representing
correctional officers understands the need to keep staffing up inside
prison fences, but it objects to the work squad cuts on moral grounds.
“It’s just sad that the public has to pay for the legislature’s
irresponsibility,” Al Shopp with the Police Benevolent Association said.
But unless funding improves, prisoners will be spending more time behind bars
and less time cleaning up roadsides. The state is cutting 71 of 180 work
squads across the state.
June 8, 2010 St Petersburg Times
On the heels of its endorsement of Alex Sink for governor, the Police
Benevolent Association has now announced it will support Loranne Ausley in
her bid to be chief financial officer. Sink's endorsement was news because
the PBA hadn't endorsed a Democrat for governor since Lawton Chiles' first
run in 1990. Now, with its endorsement of an underfunded Ausley over Senate
President Jeff Atwater, the group seems to have gotten religion on
Democrats. Unsure about why the group is making the shift, but it could
have something to do with the opening of a new private prison in North
Florida and lingering unease over potential cuts to prison workers'
pensions. Matt Puckett, the deputy executive director for the PBA, says the
group likes people "that wanted to take care of law enforcement
officers and public employees." He also noted that "it didn't
help matters" that the new private prison opened up on Atwater's
watch.
May 28, 2010 St Petersburg Times
Gov. Charlie Crist often laments "this culture of corruption in South
Florida," but increasingly it's Tallahassee that looks like a central
focus of multiple criminal investigations swirling about Florida. In recent
weeks, prominent legislators have hired criminal defense lawyers, while
high-ranking and low-ranking GOP staffers have been summoned to grand
juries meeting across the state. Among them: Crist's former top
money-raiser, Meredith O'Rourke; former state GOP executive director Jim
Rimes; and indicted ex-House Speaker Ray Sansom's former fundraising aide,
Melanie Phister, who at age 25 charged nearly $1.3 million on her state
party credit card. Veteran observers of the state's political process can't
remember a time when so many officials have been caught up in criminal
investigations. "I don't think we've ever had it at this level,'' said
longtime lobbyist Ron Book. Amid the most tumultuous and unpredictable
election year Florida has seen in decades, the names of at least a dozen
political figures have popped up in five major federal investigations
probing the pay-to-play culture of corruption in Florida: • Alan
Mendelsohn, 52, a Fort Lauderdale eye doctor and GOP campaign fundraiser, is
indicted on federal fraud and influence peddling charges. • Scott
Rothstein, 47, a Fort Lauderdale lawyer and campaign donor at the center of
a $1.2 billion Ponzi scheme, pled guilty in January to multiple federal
charges of racketeering, money laundering, fraud. • Sansom, 47, charged
with grand theft in state court for secretly putting $6 million in the
budget, is being looked at by federal officials in North Florida for his
use of a GOP credit card and his role in creating a $113 million private
prison.
May 4, 2010 Tallahassee Democrat
An influential state senator who is running for governor called for an
explanation Tuesday of how the Blackwater River prison privatization
project was handled in the state budget. Sen. Paula Dockery, R-Lakeland,
wrote to the Department of Corrections and Department of Management
Services regarding the Santa Rosa County prison. She said the Legislature
appropriated $87 million for it as a 2,000-bed privately operated prison in
2008, intending that it house medium- to close-security inmates. In the
closing days of the session that adjourned last week, the budget adopted by
the House and Senate added 224 prisoners to the institution's capacity --
potentially worth $2 million a year, or more, for GEO Group, the company
negotiating with DMS to run the prison. The appropriation was also changed
to specify that the prison will "primarily house special-needs
inmates," such as those with mental or physical health problems, and
that it would be in Santa Rosa County, she said. Dockery, who chairs the
Senate criminal justice committee, asked DOC and DMS if either department
had requested the appropriation. She also asked for a summary of responses
from companies competing for the state's business, what other locations
were considered for the institution and why it was designated for
"inmates who require chronic medical and mental health
treatment." "She's asking all the right questions," said Ken
Kopczynski, a lobbyist for the Police Benevolent Association, which represents
security officers in state-run prisons. The PBA opposes prison
privatization, which has been a highly controversial endeavor at six
corporate-run prisons in Florida. Spokeswomen for DMS and DOC said the
agencies are gathering information to respond to Dockery later this week or
next week.
May 4, 2010 St Petersburg Times
Sen. Paula Dockery, a Lakeland Republican running for governor, has
written DOC Secretary Walt McNeil and DMS Secretary Linda South to find out
more about the private prison Blackwater deal (more here on the
background). The letter is here: Dear Secretary McNeil and Secretary South:
As chair of the Florida Senate’s Committee on Criminal Justice, I am
interested in the background of the Blackwater River Correctional Facility
(Blackwater) in Santa Rosa County. I am aware that an appropriation of
approximately $87,000,000 was made in 2008 to contract for a 2,000 bed
private correctional facility to house medium and close custody inmates.
The appropriation did not specify a location for the facility or that the
facility would primarily house special needs inmates. I request
clarification about the history of the facility, including, but not limited
to, the following issues: • Whether the appropriation was requested by
either the Department of Corrections or the Department of Management
Services and, if so, the basis for the request. • A summary of the
responses to ITN #DMS 08/09-026 (including vendor, proposed location,
proposed cost, and any distinguishing features of the proposal). • The
origin of consideration of Santa Rosa County as a location for the facility
and identification of other sites that were considered. • The origin of the
decision that the majority of the inmates in the facility would be special
needs inmates who require chronic medical and mental health treatment, and
whether that decision affected the costs of construction. I would
appreciate a timely response to this request. It is not intended to be
burdensome and you should contact me or my staff if there are difficulties
with responding in a timely fashion. Warm regards, Sen. Paula Dockery
April 25, 2010 Tampa Tribune
House and Senate budget chiefs agreed Saturday to open a private prison and
pour $61 million into the University of South Florida's Lakeland campus,
but remained at odds over a variety of cuts and competing proposals. The
Legislature, in its 2008 budget, approved the construction of the private
Blackwater River Correctional Institution, responding to predictions that
the state's prison population would jump more sharply than it has. The
state-of-the-art facility now stands empty. Saturday, the House agreed to
Senate budget chief JD Alexander's plan to cut state prison beds and
eliminate more than 300 positions, mostly vacant, in the state Department
of Corrections to fill 2,224 Blackwater prison beds. That's 224 more beds
than the facility was designed to hold, raising concerns about crowding.
Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said the state can avoid that problem by
"double-bunking" dormitory space. Ken Kopczynski, political affairs
assistant for the Florida Police Benevolent Association, questioned whether
it is ethical to turn incarceration of prisoners into a profit-making
industry. With 4,000 beds or more available in the state's public prisons,
Kopczynski said, there's no reason to open a private one. Alexander
disagreed. "I just couldn't, in all conscience, sit there with a
brand-new, $120 million facility and not find a way to use it; it just
doesn't make sense to me. I think this is a reasonable compromise."
April 24, 2010 Tampa Tribune
House and Senate budget chiefs agreed Friday on money for Florida Forever
and a range of other issues, but will spend the weekend haggling over items
ranging from crisis pregnancy counseling to trading state-run prison beds
for private ones. The popular-but-pricey Florida Forever program won $15
million Friday after losing in budget negotiations last year. When the
House refused in 2009 to provide new money for the land conservation
program, its line item, to the alarm of environmentalists, vanished from
the budget. This year, the House initially left the program out of its
budget plan for the fiscal year that begins July 1. Janet Bowman of the
Nature Conservancy said environmentalists are grateful for the $15 million
"bridge" funding. The proposed cash infusion, she said, will pay
for land appraisals and allow the state to negotiate with land owners.
Other issues on which Senate and House budget chiefs agreed during the past
several days: •Spending $10 million on Everglades restoration. •Repealing a
shoreline fishing fee lawmakers passed in 2009. •Cutting state payment
rates to nursing homes by 7 percent. •Spending $200,000 on a new Innocence
Commission to study why innocent people have wound up in prison and prevent
future cases. •Spending $11.7 million on aid to libraries, less than the
full $21 million funding the Senate proposed earlier. All decisions on the
budget remain unofficial until the end of conferencing. The nursing home
rate reduction is among a handful of recent agreements considered tentative,
given concerns in both chambers about potential harm to nursing home
residents. House and Senate budget chiefs will likely wrap up their
negotiations on Sunday, at which point they forward any remaining sticking
points to House Speaker Larry Cretul and Senate President Jeff Atwater for
final decisions. Public versus private -- Among the issues still at play
this weekend: How to handle the opening of Blackwater River Corrections
Institution, a private prison in Santa Rosa County. The Legislature authorized
construction of the low-cost, highly efficient prison in response to
predictions that the prison population would jump more sharply than it has.
The Senate is proposing to shutter less efficient state facilities and
eliminate more than 300 vacant positions in the Department of Corrections
to open 2,224 beds at Blackwater. That is 224 more beds than facility was
designed to hold. Carter Goble Lee, the Atlanta-based firm contracted as
Blackwater's project manager, warned the state Department of Management Services
in an April 2 letter that the extra beds would place the state at risk of
litigation by violating an industry standard of "25 square feet of
unencumbered space per inmate." Senate budget chief JD Alexander,
R-Lake Wales, said Friday the state can avoid overcrowding by
"double-bunking" dormitory space for lower-risk inmates.
"It's typical of the kind of structure that we have in our publicly
operated prisons, so we felt like that was a good, efficient move to
contain costs." The Senate proposes more than $24 million in cuts to
the state corrections budget to offset the cost of opening Blackwater.
Meanwhile, the state has 4,000 to 5,000 vacant beds available in the
existing state system, said Ken Kopczynski, political affairs assistant for
the Florida Police Benevolent Association. "There's no need for this
prison," Kopczynski said. "They should let it sit until they need
it." Alexander said that's not acceptable. "I believe it will
save us money," he said. "It's unconscionable to me to have a
$120 million facility sitting empty - the newest, most state-of-the-art
facility. I don't know how I would tell the taxpayers that that's OK."
The House has agreed to the corresponding reduction in prison staff
vacancies, but not the extra 224 beds.
April 23, 2010 WEAR TV
It cost taxpayers over 120 million bucks and one state agency says it's not
needed. Now the deal to build a new prison in Milton is attracting the
attention of federal investigators. Dan Thomas/dthomas@weartv.com:
"Take a look we're out here at the site of the new state prison in
Milton and construction is full speed ahead out here today. It's 120
million taxpayer dollars being spent to build it out here. It could mean up
to 400 jobs here to the local economy. One major problem with the project
though? The State Department of Corrections says they don't need any of
this. It's a situation that one report out of Tallahassee says has piqued
the interest of the FBI." An unnamed source close to the
investigation, says the FBI is curious about the prison deal. One of many
dealings of former house speaker Ray Sansom currently under scrutiny. We
know the FBI has spoken to at least one person locally about the matter.
County Commissioner Don Salter says Federal agents have not talked to him
but he expects the whole thing to blow over soon. Don Salter/Santa Rosa
Commissioner: "Hopefully everything is going to workout, I suspect
after august after the primary election and in November it'll probably calm
down and everything will go forward." The state senate wants the
Blackwater prison open with prisoners shipped in from existing facilities.
Meanwhile the house didn't allocate any money to run it. Salter says the
state may have no choice but to open the prison. Don Salter/Santa Rosa
Commissioner: "It's my understanding that GEO bonded this project. The
state guaranteed those bonds. So one way or the other the taxpayers of
Florida will pay for this facility." Dan Thomas/dthomas@weartv.com:
"And just what the legislature decides to do with this facility and
those 400 jobs is expected to be decided next week." No matter what
the legislature decides, construction is expected to be complete in July.
If the facility is opened. They could start taking prisoners by November.
April 23, 2010 Florida News Network
The FBI is asking question about former House Speaker Ray Sansom’s
involvement with a legislative deal to build a private prison. The news
comes as the feds investigate Sansom, Marco Rubio, and former GOP Chairman
Jim Greer for spending millions on Republican Party of Florida credit
cards. As Whitney Ray tells us, the trouble for the GOP keeps growing. A
legislative plan to close as many as five state prisons and ship inmates to
a private prison run by GEO Group was scaled back last month by public out
cry. Former House Speaker Ray Sansom originated the deal with an amendment
in the 2008 state budget. On March 30th, a concerned citizen filed a
complaint with the US Attorney’s Office calling for an investigation. A
source familiar with the complaint says the FBI has been asking questions.
A GEO Group Lobbyist says the feds haven’t questioned him. “I never heard
anything like that at all,” said Smith. According to our source the feds
may be searching to see if Sansom received any kickbacks from the company.
GEO Group, formally known as Wackenhut, gave Sansom’s campaign 500 hundred
dollars for his 2007 campaign. The company gave 145-thousand dollars to the
Republican Party of Florida in 2008, and another 130-thousand in 2009.
Neither Sansom’s lawyer nor the FBI returned our requests for interviews.
Plans to house 22-hundred inmates in the private prison are moving forward
in this year’s budget negotiations. The Police Benevolent Association says
lawmakers should halt the prison plan. “The legislature would be smart to
the taxpayers if they stopped this deal and took another look at it,” said
Puckett. Earlier this week news broke of an FBI investigation into spending
by Sansom, and several other high ranking Republicans on party issued
credit cards. Questions about the prison deal may have spawned from their
current investigation.
April 2, 2010 WEAR TV
A prison nurse in Santa Rosa County wants a federal and state investigation
into the deal to bring the private Blackwater prison to Milton. Elva McCaig
has compiled a lengthy and detailed account of the legislative moves former
state representative Ray Sansom made in the 2008 budget to make the deal
happen. She points out that the state bought the property for the prison
from the Geo Group for $1.6 million. The state also awarded Geo the
contract to build the facility for $110 million. She goes on to allege a
number of other "back-room" transactions. McCaig is a nurse at
the state-run jail next door to the site of the new facility, and she
strongly opposes privatization of prisons.
March 31, 2010 Tampa Tribune
GOP leaders in the Florida Senate appeared Tuesday night to back off on a
controversial budget proposal that would force the closure of two state
prisons in order to open a cheaper private one. Senate Minority Leader Al
Lawson, D-Tallahassee, said Senate budget chief JD Alexander and Senate
President Jeff Atwater have agreed not to require the state to shutter two
as-yet unnamed prisons and privatize one to fill the private Blackwater
River Correctional Facility in Santa Rosa County. That privatization plan,
from Senate Ways and Means Chairman Alexander, appears in the proposed
2010-11 budget that the full Senate will begin considering today. Lawson,
who filed an amendment late Monday that would strip the Blackwater plan
from the budget entirely, said Tuesday night that he will file another that
will leave it up to the state Department of Corrections how best to fill
the private facility. Alexander and Senate President Jeff Atwater indicated
Tuesday evening that they would accept such an amendment, said Lawson,
R-Tallahassee. Lawson's district includes at least one small town fearing
the loss of a local prison rumored to be a target of closure under
Alexander's plan. "This will remove the panic," Lawson said.
Blackwater still would open this year, he said, but without an estimated
cut to prison budgets of $20 million. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said Tuesday
that he still needs to see the language of Lawson's amendment but that they
mostly have agreed on a different approach. The Legislature authorized
construction of the low-cost highly efficient Blackwater facility in 2008,
responding to predictions that the prison population would jump more
sharply than it has. There is no version of the privatization proposal in
the House. The two chambers will have to negotiate a final budget before
the end of the session.
March 30, 2010 WJHG
More than 400 people showed up at a rally in Sneads this afternoon to
protest a Senate budget-cutting proposal. The plan would supposedly save
$68 million dollars by closing two state prisons and privatize a third. But
some of the money would go to pay a private company to operate the new 2200
bed Blackwater Correctional Institute in Santa Rosa County. Folks in
Jackson County are worried Apalachee Correctional Institute will become a
victim of what they're now calling the 'Blackwater Bailout.' More than 400
people showed up at a rally in Sneads this afternoon to protest a Senate budget-cutting
proposal. The plan would supposedly save $68 million dollars by closing two
state prisons and privatize a third. But some of the money would go to pay
a private company to operate the new 2200 bed Blackwater Correctional
Institute in Santa Rosa County. Folks in Jackson County are worried
Apalachee Correctional Institute will become a victim of what they're now
calling the 'Blackwater Bailout.' Jackson County Commission Chairman Jeremy
Branch didn't sugar-coat his feelings about Blackwater Correctional
Institution. "Let me tell you what I hope it does: I hope it stays
there and I hope it turns into a tombstone for privatization, I hope it's a
monument to help symbolize the death of privatization in the state of
Florida." The new prison in Santa Rosa County is 90% complete. The
state owns it, but is planning to let a private company operate it. Branch
and others, including the top State Corrections official, hope Blackwater
never opens its doors. DOC Secretary Walter McNeil says, "I will not stand
idly by. We're gonna fight until our little fingers are down to the bone to
make sure that this does not come to fruition." Former State
Representative Loranne Ausley asks, "when our communities are
experiencing the worst employment, foreclosure rate, our budget is the
worst it has been, how is it you can find 160-million dollars to build a
prison that you don't need?!" If the state taps ACI as one of the two
prisons that will close, community leaders say it will mean 640 workers
will lose their jobs and the Sneads economy will be devastated. James
Baiardi of the Police Benevolent Association, says "this is wrong,
it's nothing more than a corporate bailout, that's all it is. They made the
mistake and they want you to pay, your community to pay and they want the
Correctional officers to pay for their mistake." 74-year-old Reverend
Willis Raines Sr. has lived in Sneads his whole life. He raised 17 kids and
knows firsthand ACI's impact on the local economy. "It creates
communities where people get their jobs and support their families in our
communities which is very, very important." Others are concerned the
state could close as many as 5 prisons and will begin the early-release of
inmates to compensate for the lack of prison beds. But former State
Representative Curtis Richardson says, "we're here to say not 'NO' but
'HELL NO!' We will not take it anymore. They c |
