By Ryan Hagen
San Bernardino County Sun
ADELANTO — The ACLU of Southern California and other groups called Friday for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to intervene at the privately-run Adelanto Detention Facility, which they say has had substandard medical care since it opened in 2011.
In a five-page letter, the ACLU and nine other legal service providers and human rights organizations list numerous instances in which they say detainees’ care was placed at unnecessary risk.
“It goes above and beyond individual cases,” ACLU attorney Michael Kaufman said in a phone interview. “What we’ve seen is a systemic pattern of delaying treatment, misdiagnosing or just not giving treatment. We’ve seen that for years now across many different detainees.”
In separate statements, both ICE and the private company that runs the facility — the GEO Group, which has had a public-private partnership with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and its predecessor since the 1980s — say Adelanto has been independently tested and found to provide quality care.
It is against policy to discuss individual cases, but the American Correctional Association gave the Adelanto facility a score of 100 percent in its most recent review, said Pablo E. Paez, on behalf of GEO.
“GEO’s facilities, including the Adelanto Detention Facility, provide high quality residential care and medical services in safe, secure, and humane environments, and our company strongly refutes allegations to the contrary,” Paez wrote in an email. “Our facilities adhere to strict contractual requirements and 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; our company works in partnership with ICE to continuously maintain the quality delivery of these services.”
And yet, the ACLU letter points to problems at other facilities operated by GEO around the world — a 2012 Department of Justice report finding “systematic, egregious, and dangerous practices,” including inadequate medical care, at a GEO facility in Mississippi and deaths at other facilities as recently as March in which GEO was found negligent in prisoners’ deaths.
As a result, the signers write, they are especially concerned about GEO’s plans to add 640 beds and house women and LGBTQ individuals there for the first time.
“If GEO is incapable of providing adequate care to the male detainees currently in its custody, how can it be trusted to provide new, specialized care to such vulnerable populations?” the letter asks. “We therefore urge ICE to immediately intervene to ensure the health and safety of the current and future detainees housed at Adelanto.”
Specifically, ICE should either take over providing health care at the prison or immediately take steps including appointing an independent investigator, and should halt plans to expand the site, the letter asks.
A statement ICE issued Friday does not directly address those requests, but it says it’s committed to providing timely, safe and appropriate treatment and that’s happening in Adelanto.
“All facilities authorized to hold long-term immigration detainees are subject to rigorous, regular inspections to ensure the welfare of those housed there,” says the statement, emailed by spokeswoman Lori K. Haley. “In 2014, the Adelanto facility underwent two comprehensive inspections, one conducted by ICE’s Office of Detention Oversight and a second top-to-bottom review by the Nakamoto Group, a private company contracted to ensure detention facilities used by ICE are in compliance with the agency’s exacting standards. Any compliance issues found during such reviews must be promptly addressed through a Uniform Corrective Action Plan.”
ICE itself found that the 2012 death of Mexican immigrant Fernando Dominguez was due to “egregious errors” committed by medical staff, the letter notes.
The ACLU points to a second death it says was also caused by inadequate medical care. An investigation into that is ongoing, so ICE can’t yet comment, Haley said.
Previously, protesters have decried conditions at the detention center.