Feds Poised To Hire Private Prison Firm With Record Of Mistreating Children To Run Detention Center
Feds Poised To Hire Private Prison Firm With Record Of Mistreating Children To Run Detention Center
by Nicole Flatow Posted on September 16, 2014 at 9:00 am
Share prices for the two major private prison firms have skyrocketed since an influx of Central American migrants crossing the Mexico border increased the likelihood of more detentions and more profit. And it turns out investors had good reason to be optimistic. Officials at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Friday they are poised to sign a final contract with private prison firm Corrections Corporation of America to house immigrant families, just a few years after the firm was forced to remove children from another Texas immigrant center because of a lawsuit over subpar conditions.
The planned detention center may hold some 2,400 immigrants doubling the existing capacity for immigrant families and intended to to accommodate the influx of individuals arriving illegally on the Southwest border, ICE spokeswoman Nina Pruneda told the Texas Observer. But advocates are outraged that ICE is signing a new contract for a major family detention center with CCA just a few years after another detention center was embroiled in controversy. T. Don Hutto Residential Center initially housed immigrant families, until the American Civil Liberties Union documented abhorrent treatment of children like mini prisoners confined to cells for 12 hours a day, and punished with prison discipline for behavior that was typical of children. A year after the ACLU settled its lawsuit with ICE, President Obama ordered children and family inmates removed from Hutto and placed in a Pennsylvania facility deemed more habitable for kids.
The controversy is one of many CCA and the other private prison operators have faced, as their incentive to profit from detention and incarceration clashes with the goals of humane treatment and rehabilitation. CCA has also faced allegations that it falsified staffing records while leaving key security posts vacant, and imposes inmate quotas in state prison contracts to keep its beds filled.
Several states have ended their contracts with CCA in the wake of these controversies. But CCA has found a new more profitable source of revenue in new immigration detention facilities. During an investor call last year, CCA Chief Executive Officer Damon Hininger assured a strong demand for beds after immigration reform.
More:
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/09/16/3567780/feds-poised-to-a-brand-new-detention-center-contract-with-private-prison-firm/
blkmusclmachine
(16,149 posts)Uncle Joe
(58,107 posts)Thanks for the thread, Judi Lynn.