Friend,

When they arrived at the southern border in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, border officials separated Marco from his brother and forced each into a separate hielera – more commonly known as “the ice box,” where migrants wait in frigid temperatures before being released to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

“I was put in the hielera for six days,” Marco said. “We were given very little food, and it was so crowded that I couldn’t sit, and I couldn’t walk. They gave me an aluminum blanket to use for warmth, but it was freezing – and we were only given one hour to sleep.”

After the sixth day, Marco – whose name has been changed in this story to protect his identity – was shipped to an immigrant prison in El Paso, Texas, where he remained until he was transferred to Stewart Detention Center in Lumpkin, Georgia, known as the “black hole” of the U.S. immigration system due to its infamous living conditions and its remote location.

Marco – an agricultural engineer who had worked in the northern part of Nicaragua – had fled his home country to escape violent political persecution there. He arrived at Stewart on July 17, 2021.

While many immigrants are released from detention on bond, parole or on their own recognizance, Marco was less fortunate because ICE detained him and refused to consider him for release for several months.

ICE had chosen to ignore the orders of a lawsuit – Fraihat v. ICE – that the SPLC filed with co-counsel on April 19, 2019. The lawsuit states that while many immigrants could have been legally released on parole or with a bond, ICE chose to detain them instead.

As a result, thousands suffered in detention, and many abandoned viable immigration claims and accepted deportation out of a desperate desire to be released or to obtain necessary medical care.

ICE’s failures, according to the lawsuit, violate immigrants’ rights under the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. What’s more, Marco and his brother had presented themselves at a designated port of entry in compliance with asylum law – but ICE chose to detain them anyway.

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