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, Over the past month, allegations of horrific treatment at the Irwin County Detention Center in Ocilla, Georgia – including women being sterilized without their consent – have shocked millions of Americans. But the Irwin detention center is just the tip of the iceberg; tens of thousands of people held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention centers across the country are subject to medical neglect and abuse every day. The women at the Irwin detention center who suffered these injustices are organizing themselves. They are speaking out. They are asking for support and demanding action. And in the meantime, they are doing their best to take care of each other. While the allegations of coerced sterilizations have been the primary focus of recent news reports, women at Irwin describe horrible and abusive conditions overall, beyond just medical care. In a seven-page, handwritten account dated Aug. 13, a woman named Ana (not her real name) described the appalling conditions: This detention center does not pay attention to, or comply with, adequate maintenance or biosecurity and hygiene conditions for living. Our unit … has leaks in the roof, leaks in the plumbing, fungus on the shower walls, as well as water leaks in the surroundings and drips, the toilets give out bad odor (black water) and the basins have leaks, towels have to be used so water does not flow across the floor and cause accidents or develop a bad odor. Insects are present, cockroaches, ants, spiders, etc. The Detention Center makes everything mentioned above look better for one to two days just before there is going to be an inspection, afterwards everything goes back the way it was. Letters from an Irwin County Jail The conditions described in Ana’s account, which was signed by 26 other women, are longstanding. Eight years ago, the ACLU of Georgia published a report on conditions in the state’s immigration detention centers that faulted the Irwin County Detention Center for its “serious and systematic problems”: Irwin’s remote location inhibits detainees [sic] ability to find representation and be able to communicate and visit with their families; living conditions are substandard; female hygiene is an area of particular concern; and detainees often go untreated or receive inadequate treatment because of understaffed medical and mental health units. Ana’s account makes clear that ICE’s tactics discourage people at Irwin from seeking the medical care they need: We want to make known that in Unit [redacted] there are detainees with serious medical conditions, grave illnesses, tachycardia, anemia, gastritis, etc. Knowing that these illnesses are high-risk. On April 20, 2020, a federal suit was won against ICE, so they must review cases of detainees who present these illnesses, but this order is not being respected or attended to by ICE. Some detainees refuse to seek medical attention for fear of being punished as has been done in the cases described above. We are sure they do this to sow fear and not receive Medical Requests. Ana’s descriptions and suspicions are corroborated by an account from another woman detained at the Irwin detention center, Emilia (also not her real name). Emilia’s account (dated Aug. 12, signed by 32 detained women) is handwritten, too, but in a tighter, more slanted script that suggests it was written urgently, almost as if the text is italicized: The staff cover up their identification so we don’t report the incidents with their names. Those in charge of medical care do not report the medical emergencies in order to ensure that there is no evidence. We are subject to lack of care, mistreatment, and negligence from Immigration. The detention center says that ICE is responsible and ICE says the detention center is responsible because they pay for each one of us. We here are nothing to them but a number and money. That’s what interests them. In a postscript, Ana echoes Emilia’s last point about the Irwin detention center’s profit motive: “Note: We have always understood that this is a For-Profit Detention Center, and for this reason the complaints that we detainees file are not important or listened to.” Irwin is one of more than 100 ICE detention centers operated by for-profit corporations. Nationwide, an estimated 72% of people held in ICE custody are in some kind of privatized detention facility. A handful of large corporations are fattening their bottom lines by warehousing people who rightfully belong with their families and communities, not in private jails where abuse is the norm. You can learn more about the SPLC’s Southeast Immigrant Freedom Initiative here. In solidarity, The Southern Poverty Law Center |
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