Freedom for Immigrants and Immigrant Action Alliance submitted this complaint regarding the excessive use of force and retaliatory solitary confinement at Glades County Detention Center against two Jamaican men who reported abuse in a prior civil rights complaint filed February 22. Both men were harmed in the act of being taken to solitary confinement; both experienced severe use of force, with one man reporting he had been “badly beaten, maced and locked in confinement,” and the other reporting his head had been dragged on the ground on the way to solitary. Read the full complaint here.
Racist, Discriminatory, and Violent Practices at Pine Prairie, Louisiana
Following the peaceful protest of Black asylum seekers held at the Pine Prairie ICE Processing Center in Pine Prairie, Louisiana, Freedom for Immigrants and its partners filed a civil rights complaint with the DHS Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL), calling on the agency to immediately halt and investigate the violent and discriminatory practices against Black asylum seekers and for their immediate release from solitary confinement. On August 10, 2020, Cameroonian asylum seekers at Pine Prairie staged a hunger strike to protest their indefinite detention, racist treatment from prison staff, and inhumane conditions amid the COVID-19 pandemic. In response, prison officials used unnecessary lethal force to place them in choke holds, pointed a gun at them and told the men they were going to be placed in solitary confinement. Read the full complaint here.