New Scrutiny as Immigrants Die in Custody

[RamboLiberal]

Source: NY Times

Sandra M. Kenley was returning home from her native Barbados in 2005 when she was swept into the United States’ fastest-growing form of incarceration, immigration detention.

Seven weeks later, Ms. Kenley died in a rural Virginia jail, where she had complained of not receiving medicine for high blood pressure. She was one of 62 immigrants to die in administrative custody since 2004, according to a new tally by Immigration and Customs Enforcement that counted many more deaths than the 20 previously known.

No government body is charged with accounting for deaths in immigration detention, a patchwork of county jails, privately run prisons and federal facilities where more than 27,500 people who are not American citizens are held on any given day while the government decides whether to deport them.

Getting details about those who die in custody is a difficult undertaking left to family members, advocacy groups and lawyers.

But as the immigration detention system balloons to meet demands for stricter enforcement of immigration laws, deaths in custody — and the secrecy and confusion around them — are drawing increased scrutiny from lawmakers and from government investigators.


Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/26/us/26detain.html?hp

[Zodiak]

1. New headline: America kills immigrants through neglect

62 to be exact.

My god, we killed two classrooms full of them.

[saigon68]

2. That's OK--- most of them were minorities, black etc

</sarcasm>

[pampango]

3. And probably "illegal" to boot. Another reason they "count" less. n/t

[originalpckelly]

4. "Well they're invading America and they are stealing your jobs!"

"And I promise, this has nothing to do with them being foreigners or minorities, no it's only because they broke our laws!"

:puke:

[saigon68]

5. Yes another reason to abuse these people

Public humiliation before a public stoning