12334: Detainees' plight getting attention (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Detainees' plight getting attention

By Jody A. Benjamin
Staff Writer
Posted June 15 2002

Members of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights will hear testimony next week
about the plight of more than 200 Haitian refugees detained in South Florida
since December.

The commission is scheduled to hold a two-hour informal briefing Friday on
the subject with input from immigration attorneys, local Haitian community
leaders and a former detainee.

The hearing, which is open to the public, begins at 9:30 a.m. at the Hyatt
Regency Hotel, 400 NE Second Ave., in Miami.

Afterward, commission members are scheduled to visit detainees at the Turner
Guilford Knight Correctional Center, the maximum-security jail in Miami
where about 60 Haitian women are housed.

"The commission has long been concerned about this issue,'' spokeswoman
Nathea Lee said. "We thought this was a good opportunity to learn more."

Also on Friday, a spokesman for the Immigration and Naturalization Service
in Washington said that INS Commissioner James Ziglar will visit Miami on
July 15, along with Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Florida.

But while both events will help publicize the refugees' plight, advocates
fear time is running out for most of the Haitians detained since Dec. 3,
when their arrival aboard a rickety boat prompted INS to change its policy
toward Haitian asylum seekers.

Even as the list of dignitaries expressing interest in the matter grows, the
cases of those detained move further along in the legal process -- and
therefore become harder to undo. Advocates said that most of the Haitians
still did not have lawyers.

"Time is against us,'' said Cheryl Little executive director of the Florida
Immigrant Advocacy Center.

Immigrant advocates have asked the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to
reconsider a federal court ruling in May denying release to the Haitians.

At the very least, immigrant advocates said they hoped the commission
briefing would create an additional public record of how the INS is treating
Haitian asylum seekers.

"The only way we are going to change this policy is to have enough of the
public made aware of this discriminatory policy,'' said Howard Simon,
executive director of the ACLU in Florida.

"We need them to be the conscience of this nation and of this government."

Also on Friday, the Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center released details about
a Haitian detainee at Krome who attempted suicide on June 2. The agency did
not release the detainee's name but said he was in his 30s.

According to the statement, the detainee said he found a tube with fabric at
the end of it in a bathroom. He said he made a noose of the fabric, placed
it around his neck and tried to hang himself while reading passages from his
Bible.

Another detainee entered the bathroom and pulled him down, according to the
statement. The detainee spent two days in the medical center at Krome.

"I kept thinking about my kids, all my little kids, and how I'm here and
locked up and not going anywhere and how I can't do anything for them,'' the
statement quoted him.

INS said the detainee indicated he was giving up his asylum claim and wanted
to return to Haiti.

But the Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center, which is now representing him,
said he continued to fear for his life in Haiti.




Copyright © 2002, South Florida Sun-Sentinel


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