Conditions in the Custody of Customs and Border Protection: “I thought I was going to die.”

COUNTR Y OF ORIGIN L ANGU AG E

Cuba, 38%

Honduras, 25%

El Salvador, 10%

Guatemala, 8%

Venezuela, 7%

Nicaragua, 3%

Mexico, 2%

Haiti, 2%

Other, 5% Angola,Belize,Brazil,Cambodia, Cameroon,China,Colombia,the Congo,Côte D’ivoire,the Democratic Republic of the Congo,Ecuador,Guinea, Kenya,Peru,Sierra Leone, Spain, and Uganda Spanish, 94% Other, 6% Achi, Creole,English, French,Galician,Garifuna, Kaqchikel,Lingala, Macedonian, Man, Portuguese, Qanjobal, Qeqchi, Quiche, Swahili

reporting primary languages such as Haitian Creole, English, and Garifuna, the actual number of non-Spanish speakers is likely higher due to the stigma associated with being Indigenous or, generally, a non-Spanish speaker. Non-Spanish speakers reported fearing additional persecution, bias from the government and medical professionals, and isolation. Language access and its impacts on meaningful access to counsel and medical care will be discussed in greater detail in later sections. On average, adult women clients were older than adults detained as parents in a family unit. The average age of adult women clients was 31, but clients ranged in age from 18 to 74. At the time of detention, at least 955 women were under the age of 25 and at least 103 women were over 55.

With ICE’s shift to the detention of adult women, RAICES saw a shift towards asylum claims based on sexual and domestic violence. In terms of medical

needs, women and the elderly tend to be at particular risk of mental distress compared to other migrants.23 Elderly people are also more likely to develop multiple health conditions at once, as well as geriatric syndromes significantly impacting functioning and quality of life.24

In addition to changes in country of origin and age, there was a notable spike in reports of family separation among the detained women. This is a reflection of the mass scale of family separation that occurs regularly for people in adult immigrant detention.25 Family separation is typically thought of as the separation of a young child from their parents and became notorious with Trump’s Zero Tolerance policy. However, RAICES saw high instances of women separated from their adult children, grandparents separated from their grandchildren, siblings separated from their minor siblings and more. In total, 839 women reported to RAICES that they were separated from family members. Of these women, 225 were separated from their partner, 164 from their sibling(s), 93 from their adult child(ren), 89 from their parent(s), 125 from other family members (i.e. nieces, nephews, cousins, etc.), and 30 from their grandchildren. Some women had proof of custody for children they traveled with from their country of origin which went unrecognized by ICE who then separated the family. Even for families who are not separated in the long term, DHS often still imprisons families separately from one another while in CBP custody, and by gender in the same prison when two-parent families are detained. Family separation is not a one-time policy, but a daily feature of the immigrant detention apparatus. Additionally, all forms of detention inherently produce family separation by removing individuals from their families, their loved ones, and their communities.

Whether by force or by choice, people come to the U.S. from all over the world, often because it is “the land of the free,” or because of the myth of the American dream, or because of the long history of migration since the inception of the United States as a colony and prior. Yet, the abuses of CBP are the “welcome” the U.S. gives to asylum seekers and other migrants.

The chaos of inconsistent procedures and flagrant mistreatment in CBP custody normalizes abuse and a culture of fear, intimidation, and retaliation for migrants in the custody of the U.S. government. Multiple women reported to RAICES that CBP officers 26 explicitly told them they have no rights in the U.S., and CBP officers intimidated women with the outright violation of their rights. Because CBP custody is usually the first experience migrants have in the U.S. immigration prison system, it can paint their expectations for the rest of their immigration experience and can prime people to believe they have no rights as immigrants.

Colloquially, CBP prisons have come to be known as the “hielera” (Spanish for “freezer” or “ice box”) and the “perrera” (Spanish for “dog pound”) due to the harsh, cold temperatures and the cage-like structures in

23. Stephen A. Matlin, et al., Migrants’ And Refugees’ Health: Towards An Agenda Of Solutions, Pub. Health Rev., Sep. 24, 2018, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6182765/ 24. N/A, Ageing And Health, World Health Org., Feb. 5, 2018, https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/ageing-andhealth; See also Sharon K. Inouye, M.D. et al. Geriatric Syndromes: Clinical, Research and Policy Implications of a Core Geriatric Concept, J Am Geriatr Soc. June 3, 2008, 25. Andrea Meza, Why The Biden Administration Must End Family Immigration Detention, The Appeal, Jan. 28, 2021, https://theappeal.org/why-the-biden-administration-must-end-family-immigration-detention/

which CBP incarcerates migrants. Mistreatment in CBP custody is rampant and includes deprivation of food, water, and medical care, and physical and verbal abuse by officers, among other issues.27

Beyond blatant mistreatment, CBP also acts with relative impunity in terms of how it processes arriving migrants for their next steps—either immediate deportation or moving on to the next step in immigration proceedings. Multiple women with whom RAICES spoke reported witnessing CBP process people for deportation even after they had asserted their right to seek asylum. Some women even reported having undergone this experience in past entries to the United States, imploring officers to let them seek asylum and ultimately being ignored and deported.

Not only can people simply be ignored and processed for deportation against their legal rights and will, but the inconsistency with which CBP processes people can also have hugely detrimental impacts on people who are allowed to proceed with their immigration cases in the U.S. as opposed to being immediately deported. CBP screenings are faulty and the records of their interactions with migrants are notoriously inaccurate.28

For example, RAICES clients at Karnes often discovered that CBP’s notes of their initial screening did not at all match the conversation they had with the CBP officer. With RAICES staff able to read and translate the English language notes, women were alarmed to discover that offi-

26. References to CBP Officers could include officers from both the Office of Field Operations who function as “customs” at ports of entry and officers from the notorious Border Patrol division who operate both at and between ports of entry.

27. N/A, In The Freezer, Hum. Rts. Watch, Feb. 2018, https://www. hrw.org/report/2018/02/28/freezer/abusive-conditions-women-and-children-us-immigration-holding-cells 28.John Washington, Bad Information: Border Patrol Arrest Reports Are Full of Lies That Can Sabotage Asylum Claims, The Intercept, Aug. 11, 2019, https://theintercept.com/2019/08/11/border-patrolasylum-claim/

women reported to RAICES that they were separated from family members

were separated from their partner

from their sibling

from their adult child(ren)

from their parent(s)

from other family members (i.e. nieces, nephews, cousins, etc.)

from their grandchildren

The border breaks up Indigenous land and peoples, and enforcement of the U.S. border is often taken wholly out of context from the ongoing legacy of U.S. government and private corporate intervention and exploitation around the globe that pushes people to migrate in the first place.

For more information about the white supremacist and colonizer history of Border Patrol, please see “Migra! A History of the U.S. Border Patrol” by Kelly Lytle Hernandez.

Migrants walk on a dirt road after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, Tuesday, March 23, 2021, in Mission, Texas. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

were built for temporary detention of Mexican men who would be quickly sent back across the border after apprehension. Thus, they were designed to be harsh and minimal. When CBP began to hold families in these facilities, overcrowding quickly occurred and they became known as the “hieleras.” Historically, most asylum seekers who are detained at Karnes entered the U.S. along the Texas border, primarily through the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) region. In 2014, the Obama Administration created secondary holding facilities which came to be known as the “perreras” in the RGV. Since that time, CBP has created new “improved” facilities for temporary detention at the border, and asylum seekers at Karnes have arrived from various regions along the border and may have experienced different locations and modes of CBP detention.

One of the authors recently visited the “state of the art” CBP detention facility in El Paso, Texas and was struck by its structural similarity to the hieleras, albeit with newer materials and covering a larger space. The same hallmarks of the hieleras, including 24 hour overhead lights, a lack of windows, open toilets in large shared rooms, and rooms situated along hallways with viewing windows for supervision, replicate many of the features asylum seekers report as contributing to the inhumane experience of CBP custody. No matter where along the border or in what grade of a facility a migrant person is detained, the primary contributing factor to abuse in CBP custody is the flagrant lack of oversight at all CBP holding locations. Along with ICE prisons, CBP detention must be abolished in order to create a humane reception process for asylum seekers and other migrants.

https://www.elpasotimes.com/story/ news/2021/05/25/el-paso-border-patrol-cbp-migrant-central-processing-center-site/5167763001/. cers failed to record that they had come to the U.S. seeking safety, the details of the persecution they had disclosed, and had instead recorded that they came to the U.S. “to work.”29

The systematic inaccuracy of CBP notes has severe consequences. Unfortunately, it is commonplace for judges to raise the CBP notes as a credibility issue for asylum seekers, and credibility issues can be the deciding factor in a judge ultimately ordering deportation in the final asylum hearing. Considering the prevalence of mistreatment in CBP custody, it is of little surprise that people are not processed in a fair, humane, and accurate manner despite the fact that wrongful deportation of an asylum seeker can be deadly.

In addition to mistreatment and wrongful processing, CBP also detained women beyond the lawful time limit. According to CBP’s National Standards,30 people “should generally not be held for longer than 72 hours in CBP hold rooms or holding facilities. Every effort must be made to hold detainees for the least amount of time required for their processing, transfer, release, or repatriation as appropriate and as operationally feasible.” The realities women reported differed drastically from this standard. Of the approximately 1,900 women who reported their length of stay in CBP custody to RAICES, at least 1,453 reported imprisonment over 3 days. At least 54 women reported that CBP detained them for 30 days or more. At least 7 women remained in CBP custody for 40 days or more, and at least 2 women survived over 50 days in CBP custody. It is crucial to remember that during this lengthy detention, women often were not provided with changes of clothes and were held in either the hielera or perrera for the entirety of their detention, both facilities that offer no privacy. Some women, including those detained for over 30 days, reported that they were not provided menstrual hygiene products in CBP custody, and several reported developing urinary tract infections from the lack of access to sanitation and the denial of treatment.

29. Id. 30. CBP, National Standards on Transport, Escort, Detention, and Search, Oct. 2015, https://www.cbp.gov/sites/default/files/assets/ documents/2020-Feb/cbp-teds-policy-october2015.pdf

CBP and ICE standards for detention length and treatment are aspirational at best, and this is one more reason why abolition is necessary. The standards employ language that leaves room for exceptions that the government rarely justifies or publicly discloses. The lack of enforcement of the 72 hours or less rule is consistent with what RAICES has observed at the Karnes family prison in 2021, in that the government has stated it shall make efforts to detain families for 3 days or less yet RAICES consistently encounters families who have been imprisoned for longer.

Though many women reported a length of imprisonment in violation of policy, any amount of time in CBP custody is harmful. The next section illuminates some of these inherent harms. In response to open-ended questions about conditions of CBP custody, women reported deplorable experiences, with at least 633 women disclosing that they suffered mistreatment at the hands of CBP officers.

Multiple women reported that even the officers who did not directly engage in abusive behavior nonetheless allowed the abuse to happen without intervention.31 The data on mistreatment included here is from collected anecdotes, but the experiences are representative of the systemic human rights abuses people experience in incarceration generally.

31. This occurrence is recognized in abolitionist theory wherein systems of policing and incarceration, which are inherently related to immigration detention, are upheld by both “good” and ``bad faith’’ actors. See generally Derecka Purnell, How I Became a Police Abolitionist, The Atl., July 6, 2020, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/how-i-became-police-abolitionist/613540/ (“The police officers who are doing the “right thing” maintain the systems of inequality and ableism in black communities. The right thing is wrong.”).

• vs

• No toothbrush or paste for entire stay

• No soap for entire stay

• Ticks and/or fleas on the floor • Denied clean clothes

• Denied dry clothes after crossing river

• Denied towels

• Denied menstrual products

• Vomit and other waste left on floor (imprisoned people attempted to clean but had no materials)

• No food

• Too little food (ex: only a bread roll and bologna once a day, only one taco or cracker per day, etc.)

• Rotten or moldy food

• Frozen food

• Food with worms in it

• Officers threw food or plate of food at person or on ground instead of serving it

• Specific people denied food at mealtime because of asking officers about food

• Woken in the middle of the night by officers without explanation • Slept on the floor, slept in the bathroom, slept in cramped space, etc.

• Forced to share sleeping space or materials with someone

• Cold temperatures

VERBAL ABUSE BY OFFICERS (ANY INTIMIDATION OTHER THAN YELLING THAT ISN’T PHYSICAL ABUSE)

• Called an “animal,” a “ fucking bitch,” or “damn bitch,” (many variations of bitch reported), “shit,” “damned immigrant,” “fucking illegals,” “garbage,” “criminals,” “dumb asses,” “liars,” “dirty”, “pigs,” “ungrateful,”

• Discrimination or insult on the basis of race and/or skin color (ex: called the n-word), discrimination or insult on the basis of sexual orientation (for being queer), discrimination or insult on the basis of national origin (“damn Hondurans,” “Honduran pigs,” “dirty Cubans,” etc.), discrimination or insult on the basis of ethnicity (for being Latina), etc.

• Told “you have no rights,” told “this is the treatment you deserve for coming to this country,” told to “go back to your country,” told “you are nobody,” told “it’s not our responsibility to feed you,” told “you aren’t wanted here,” told “you stink” while being denied a bath, told “you will fuck up this country,” told “you don’t have the right to ask for anything because you are a nobody,” told “the more you complain the longer you’ll be here,” told “we are going to deport you all,” told “you must sign” on documents, told “we don’t care why you’re here” while trying to seek asylum, told “we can do whatever we want” regarding CBP officers’ power, told “we can throw you on the ground” regarding CBP officers’ power, told “why did you even bother to cross [the border]?” told “do you guys think any of you could be my neighbor? No, you all are shits and shits belong with shits,” told “don’t say that” regarding disclosures about asylum claim, told “we can arrest you, hit you, and we want to make you disappear,” told “in this country, you have no rights as a woman,” told not to continue in the asylum process, told “you don’t qualify for asylum,” told “if you don’t like it here, you should sign for your deportation,” told “don’t try anything, I have a gun,” told “get up, dogs!” at 1 AM for no reason, told “I’m not going to lose my job for a rat,” told “the only pills or medicine we have are rat poison which we can bring y’all if y’all want,”

• Threatened with being shot for not remaining in line during processing, threatened with being shot for running

• Insulted and/or threatened with deportation or a longer stay in CBP custody for asking for basic necessities like food, medical care, help with pregnancy, water, a towel or sanitary wipe, etc.

• Shown the middle finger, officers covered noses/mouth in disgust when near migrants, officers refused to look at migrants, laughed at for struggling with the inhumane conditions, laughed at for crying, pointed at with a gun while being taken into custody, officers threw things (food, water, personal belongings, immigration paperwork), when sweeping officers swept rocks at asylum seekers, migrants made to beg in order to access menstrual products and blankets

YELLED AT BY OFFICERS

• No medical care for cancer, seizure, pregnancy, rape, pain from preexisting conditions/injuries, fainting, sprained or broken bones and joints, gastrointestinal distress (such as vomiting, diarrhea, and nausea), cold and flu, chicken pox, urinary tract infections, etc.

• People fainted and were left on the floor by officers, people vomited and were left on the floor by officers • Told not to request medical care, told “no” when requesting medical care, threatened with longer detention stay if requesting medical care (including for pregnancy)

• Waiting for days before even receiving a response from officers (if any) when requesting care, forced to wait hours to speak to a medical official after requesting care, told the delay in receiving medical care (3 days no care for fever) was because they crossed the border illegally, forced to show where bleeding on the stomach in order to receive care (not believed until then)

• No water, too little water

• Bad water (ex: water tasting of chlorine, extremely brown water, water with cockroaches and mosquitoes in it, etc.), only accessible water in the toilet

• Officers threw water on the ground or at a detained person instead of serving it, etc.

• Screamed at by officers, yelled at by officers • Yelled at for not knowing the answer to a question, yelled at or screamed at in the middle of the night, yelled at or screamed at for asking for basic needs like food, medical care, water, a towel or sanitary wipe, a piece of paper, a phone call, etc.

PHYSICAL MISTREATMENT/ABUSE BY OFFICERS

• Kicked (ex: kicked in order to wake up while sleeping on the floor), slapped/hit/gloved, pushed, pinned against a wall, grabbed by the throat, underwent violating and/or rough personal searches, etc.

• Witnessed officers beating immigrant men with nightsticks and saying “like in baseball!” as if it were a joke during the abuse, witnessed an officer hit a child whose leg had been operated on and the wound then became swollen, witnessed an officer push a pregnant woman who had fainted up against a wall, etc.

• Lights on 24/7

• Officers blaring loud metal or rock music in the middle of the night

• Had to use the toilet in front of others, had to clean self in front of others

In its totality, the abuse women reported in CBP custody is overwhelming. At least 633 out of approximately 1,900 women reported experiencing mistreatment inflicted by CBP officers while in custody, despite the fear of retaliation and the open-ended nature of RAICES intake questions. The totals in the table on the preceding pages note how many instances were reported of each type of mistreatment, as many women reported multiple types of mistreatment. Due to the many different forms of verbal abuse reported, RAICES includes a category solely on yelling or screaming as a spotlight issue separate from specific instances of verbal abuse. Gestures, although not verbal, are included in the verbal abuse section to limit confusion with instances of literal physical aggression by CBP officers. It is notable that despite the differences in location along the border and the time when women were detained in CBP custody, data collected consistently reflects similar accounts of mistreatment.

In spite of the brutality of CBP conditions, at least one woman acknowledged that people are afraid to speak out due to fear of deportation. This speaks volumes to the abysmal conditions in CBP custody that, despite valid fears of reprisal--that could lead to potentially fatal deportation as asylum seekers-- women recounted mistreatment with such prevalence. Furthermore, these reports of mistreatment are consistent with what other migrants, medical professionals, attorneys, and advocates have been decrying for years.32 Mistreatment is not an outlier; in CBP custody, it is the norm.

The evidence of systemic abuse inherent to the way CBP operates is overwhelming, despite the lack of transparency in its operations. CBP’s racist origins as a militarized police apparatus make it clear that it is beyond reform. 33 While CBP continues to detain people, the first “welcome” migrants receive when arriving at the U.S. southern border will continue to be abuse and/or will prime them to expect violation of their rights as an inherent part of their interactions with immigration enforcement throughout the immigration process. CBP, like ICE, must be abolished, and community based solutions for a welcoming border that center human needs should be embraced.

32. Advocates have noted an uptick in deaths in immigrant detention in recent years. See for the proposition that some statistics on death in custody fail to account for those who die after getting out of custody due to complications that arose while in custody. Katy Murzda, M.A. and Walter Ewing, Ph.D., The Legacy of Racism Within The U.S. Border Patrol, Am. Immigr. Council, Feb. 2021, https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/sites/default/files/research/the_legacy_of_racism_within_the_u.s._border_patrol. pdf See also Additional Reading section of this report.

33.Harsha Walia, Confronting The Long Arc of U.S. Border Policy, The Intercept, Feb. 7, 2021, https://theintercept.com/2021/02/07/ border-and-rule-biden-immigration-policy/

It is well documented that detention impedes access to counsel in both criminal and immigrant prison settings. Migrants may be released to continue fighting their deportation in the community or they may face potentially indefinite detention in ICE custody.34 In ICE prisons, people encounter a number of indignities as they fight their deportations, including extremely limited access to counsel. Many cannot access an attorney at all. Programs which provide universal legal aid in detention centers are rare. Unlike in criminal legal proceedings, there is no government-provided representation for those who cannot afford or cannot access an attorney, though a government-funded attorney is present arguing for their deportation.35 Detention exacerbates many of the existing barriers to representation, with only 14% of detained immigrants fighting removal securing legal representation, compared to 66% of those released or never detained.36 Most detention centers are remote, far away from larger cities where there are more attorneys.37 If someone is able to find an attorney and the attorney is able to travel to the prison, attorneys are faced with long wait times and complicated visitation policies that vary from prison to prison.38 If detained people choose to meet with their attorney by phone, they are faced with the high price of phone calls, reportedly ranging from 10 cents to three dollars to as high as eight dollars a minute for domestic calls.39 In addition to the minute rate, there are other reported fees such as “connection charges.”40 While detained people can work to earn phone minutes or commissary money, they may earn only one to three dollars a day. They are not paid for the cleaning that GEO obligates detained people to perform in their own cells and bathrooms. Further, people may be transferred to different prisons with no notice to their attorney on record, and there is little that an attorney can do to prevent or undo a transfer.41

34. In RAICES’ experience and as alluded to in the former section, CBP seems to act arbitrarily in terms of who is released to continue their case in freedom as opposed to transferred to ICE detention to continue their case while imprisoned. 35. N/A. Access to Counsel, Natl. Immigrant Justice Ctr., https://immigrantjustice.org/issues/access-counsel; Some cities have moved to allocate funds toward providing immigration court defense in the model of public defenders, but this is not the norm. See, e.g. https://www.vera.org/projects/new-york-immigrant-family-unity-project 36. N/A, The Right To Be Heard From Immigration Prisons: Locating a Right Of Access To Counsel For Immigration Detainees In The Right Of Access To Courts, 132, Harv. L. Rev., 726 (Dec. 2018) 37. Yuki Noguchi, Unequal Outcomes: Most ICE Detainees Held In Rural Areas Where Deportation Risks Soar, NPR, Aug. 15, 2019, https://www.npr.org/2019/08/15/748764322/unequal-outcomes-most-ice-detainees-held-in-rural-areas-where-deportation-risks 38. Id. 39. Shannon Najmabadi, Detained Migrant Parents Have To Pay To Call Their Family Members. Some Can’t Afford To. The Tex. Tribunal. July 3, 2018, https://www.texastribune.org/2018/07/03/separated-migrant-families-charged-phone-calls-ice/# 40. Miriam Valverde, Bill Nelson Claims Detained Immigrant Parents Charged $8/Minute To Call Their Children. Is It True? https:// www.politifact.com/factchecks/2018/jul/26/bill-nelson/bill-nelson-claims-detained-immigrant-parents-char/ AND https://www. imwong.com/immigration-news/our-immigration-blog-cost-calling-detention-center/ 41. N/A, The Right To Be Heard From Immigration Prisons: Locating a Right Of Access To Counsel For Immigration Detainees In The Right Of Access To Courts, 132, Harv. L. Rev., 726 (Dec. 2018)