Immigrants who are staying at an I.C.E. detention center may be subjected to harassment and excessive force from guards who are responsible for helping them.

In a recent report by The Independent, immigrants staying at the Stewart Detention Center in Georgia were allegedly thrown out of their wheelchairs or slammed to the ground when they asked for medical help. The detention facility is currently run privately by CoreCivic.

Needing Help

In early April, an immigrant named Roberto-Blanco Gonzales noticed he was developing symptoms associated with the novel coronavirus. He had submitted requests for medical attention for two weeks, but his pleas were ignored.

Blanco staged a one-man protest by sitting at a table in his unit. He refused to go back to his cell despite guards ordering him to do so. He said an officer approached him and threatened to place him in solitary confinement. Blanco also claimed the officer told him "to go die with the sick ones in the hole."

In reports obtained by The Intercept, the guard wrote "refusing to obey staff" in Blanco's disciplinary document. He was taken to the clinic and given pills for his stomach pain following his protest.

Four unnamed guards fetched him from the clinic and placed him in solitary as punishment for protesting. Blanco refused to go. According to records, force was used to secure Blanco after he "attempted to break away" from the emergency response team. But Blanco painted a more brutal picture of the incident.

The immigrant said the officers grabbed and slammed him to the ground. His head reportedly hit the floor, and a guard pressed his foot onto it. The impact damaged his right eye, causing a blood clot that was still present two months after the incident.

Blanco was not given access to an eye specialist before he was deported. He tested positive for COVID-19 in El Salvador in late May.

Hugh Tinarwo, an immigrant from Zimbabwe, also accused I.C.E. officers of shooting at him using pepper-ball ammunition and throwing him out of his wheelchair. The incident, he claimes, also involved the guards dragging him away to solitary confinement and pressing on his neck.

Tinarwo uses a wheelchair due to an injury he sustained before arriving in the U.S. The incident caused the pain to become worse. Now, he needs other people to push his wheelchair for him.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement

In early June, a federal lawsuit accused the I.C.E. of forcing asylum-seekers to clean detention centers hit with COVID-19 using their bare hands. The immigrants said they were asked to clean the trash from the infirmary where infected detainees were treated. They were also forced to clean feces from a cell without being given gloves.

The suit, which was filed in Arizona, said the detainees were given sandwiches with rotten ham to eat. Additionally, they were refused access to daily baths and toilet paper. Those who protested against the treatment were placed in solitary confinement indefinitely.

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