Advocates for immigrants demand the release of detainees in Elizabeth

Four people detained at Elizabeth Detention Center in Elizabeth filed a lawsuit on Friday, May 15 calling for the release of all detainees from the facility. The plaintiffs claim the center, operated by a for-profit company called CoreCivic for the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), has failed to address growing public health concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Héctor García Mendoza, one of the plaintiffs in the case, was suddenly issued an order of deportation after the lawsuit was filed. Advocates believe this was done in retaliation for filing the lawsuit against the detention center. Eighteen members of Congress have signed a letter demanding answers from ICE about the deportation.

“It was totally about the lawsuit to close down EDC, and Hector was the easiest of the four plaintiffs to pick on. It had to do with the fact that he was the easiest one to deport. We don’t know if he’s alive or dead. It’s a crime against Hector, it’s a crime against humanity,” said Rita Dentino, director of Casa Freehold in Freehold.

Although Mendoza was issued a stay of removal on Monday, May 18, ICE deported him on Tuesday morning, according to a press conference last Wednesday. They said Mendoza also suffered from asthma, and was refused adequate treatment while detained.

Mendoza was taken to Newark Airport, where he was flown to Laredo, Texas, and walked across the border, said Kathy O’Leary, Pax Christi Region Coordinator for New Jersey.

“We don’t have any updates on his situation since last week,” O’Leary said, “We believe he was walked across the border and just left there, in an area that is known for cartel-related violence, forced labor, and human trafficking.”

In response to García Mendoza’s deportation, New Jersey Advocates for Immigrant Detainees held an event to show their solidarity with those struggling to obtain their release from the detention center. The statewide event corresponded with a national Day of Action organized by Detention Watch Network to demand the immediate release of all detained people. New Jersey Advocates also criticized Elberon, a local development group that owns the Elizabeth Detention Center property, demanding the group stop leasing to CoreCivic and pay reparations to families separated by ICE at the detention center.

The day started with an online briefing on the NJ Advocates Facebook page, followed by protests.

Unsanitary conditions, overcrowding and lacking medical care have been reported of detention centers across the country. At least 18 detainees in the Elizabeth Detention Center have contracted COVID-19 as of May 16, according to ICE.

“We’ve been fighting against what’s going on in immigration centers for a long time, but with coronavirus, it’s a whole other level. It’s giving people a death sentence,” Dentino said.

Although advocates for prisoners say conditions at the Elizabeth Detention Center have always been horrible, the center has been especially uncommunicative in the past few months and won’t respond to emails, phone calls or inquiries, said Rosa Santana, program director of First Friends of New Jersey and New York. First Friends has been doing advocacy work at the Elizabeth Detention Center for 20 years.

The organization has struggled to do work at the center, advocates said. Volunteers send letters but have received no responses from detainees and are unsure if their mail is arriving. First Friends typically runs a hotline to speak with detainees on a daily basis and connect them with legal representation and family members, but the hotline at the Elizabeth Detention Center was shut down in late January.

“We feel lost, not knowing what’s happening at the facility,” Santana said. “There could be detainees there without representation.”

O’Leary hopes events like the one held Thursday will galvanize the Elizabeth and New Jersey communities to speak out against the detention center.

“Our goal is to expose the financial and political ties that allow the EDC to exist in a city that is supposed to be welcoming to immigrants,” she said.

When O’Leary and her colleagues at New Jersey Advocates For Immigrant Detainees learned of García Mendoza’s deportation order last Tuesday, they organized an emergency action. Protestors arrived at the detention center on Tuesday, May 19, at 5:30 p.m. and planned to stay outside the building for 18 hours until the press conference scheduled for the following day at noon. Within the first hour, several police cars showed up, according to O’Leary.

“Police came four to five times during our protest. There were always at least four police cars who showed up, and the last time it was as many as ten, which seems like an unfortunate response for a group of 10 to 12 peaceful protestors,” she said.

Around 11 a.m. on Wednesday, police asked the protestors to leave the property. That was when protestors learned the property was owned by Elberon, a company with significant ties to local politicians and charities, according to advocates. Company officials asked the police to remove the protestors, O’Leary said.