“No human being should ever have to go through this,” Angye said in a statement released by the American Civil Liberties Union. “I have already experienced torture in my home country of Cameroon and I never thought I would experience such severely violent treatment by guards here in the United States of America.”
Four detainees at the largest Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in the United States have filed a federal lawsuit describing humans rights abuses, “horrific” living conditions, and “severe medical neglect.”
According to National Public Radio, the lawsuit was filed late last week in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas. All four of the plaintiffs were detained at Camp East Montana at the U.S. Army’s Fort Bliss near El Paso. The lawsuit claims that conditions at Camp East Montana are inhumane, with guards frequently violating immigrants’ human and constitutional rights.
“Detained people are regularly subjected to severe beatings or sexual harassment by guards; squalid living conditions; spoiled and inadequate food; no meaningful programming or recreation; inadequate access to basic hygiene products such as soap, razors or nail clippers; outbreaks of disease; and limited or no access to sunlight,” the lawsuit alleges.
NPR notes that, though Camp East Montana is the largest detention center of its kind, this lawsuit is the first to be filed against the facility.
“Camp East Montana is nothing short of a civil rights catastrophe,” said Kyle Virgien, a senior staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Prison Project. “We’re suing to ensure that no other human being has to endure the inhumane treatment that the Trump administration has inflicted on our clients.”
The lawsuit was filed on behalf of four immigrants, all of whom are currently held at Fort Bliss. They are seeking class-action certification. If approved, the class could include all persons currently or formerly held at Camp East Montana who were subjected to allegedly inhumane conditions.
Gerald Akari Angye, one of the named plaintiffs, said that he was beaten by guards so severely that he had to be hospitalized and placed in a wheel chair. Angye said he’d been at Camp East Montana for less than a month before being locked in solitary confinement for more than two weeks.
“No human being should ever have to go through this,” Angye said in a statement released by the American Civil Liberties Union. “I have already experienced torture in my home country of Cameroon and I never thought I would experience such severely violent treatment by guards here in the United States of America.”
Another plaintiff, Navdeep, said he was kept in a cell that was regularly flooded by toilet water. He also reported difficulty obtaining drinking water and was allegedly forced to wear the same clothes, including underwear, for more than three weeks.
“We could die here, and it feels like no one would care,” he said.
Attorneys for the two men say that neither has a criminal record.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, the parent agency of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, has since described the detainees’ allegations as “categorically false.”
“Ensuring the safety, security, and well-being of individuals in our custody is the top priority at ICE,” a spokesperson told The Texas Tribune.
Sources
‘Dire’ conditions at ICE facility severely violate human rights, lawsuit claims
ICE sued over “inhumane” conditions at Camp East Montana in West Texas
Immigrant detainees sue over ‘horrific’ conditions at Texas ICE facility
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