Families allege Newark ICE center guards beat, tear-gassed detainees

Advocates and family members of detainees at the Delaney Hall immigration detention center in Newark alleged Thursday afternoon guards had moved through units, beating people and using tear gas, as a detainee hunger strike continued for its seventh day.

Gothamist witnessed multiple University Hospital ambulances arrive, each transporting people who’d been carried out of the center on stretchers.

Multiple people who described themselves as family members of detainees made the claims outside the center’s gates or when contacted by Gothamist Thursday, saying they’d been in touch with their loved ones inside the center. Immigrant advocates also said they’d received reports of the alleged beatings from family members of detainees.

“We were told that the agents went through all the units using pepper spray, using gas,” said Catalina Adorno, an organizer with the immigrant advocacy group Cosecha NJ. “The gas is everywhere. People can't breathe. They moved folks around them. They try to break them up. All the vents are closed as of now.”

In statements sent to Gothamist, both ICE and the Geo Group, the private contractor that runs the ICE detention center, said staff had responded to a fight among detainees. Geo Group spokesperson Christopher V. Ferreira said staff had “implemented appropriate response and control measures to safely resolve the situation, including the limited use of chemical agents.”

Rep. Rob Menendez of New Jersey, who came to the site Thursday afternoon amid reports of the violence for an unannounced oversight visit with fellow Democratic New Jersey Reps. Analilia Mejia and Frank Pallone, said staff at Delaney Hall told him the incident was largely isolated to the center’s Unit 2, the unit farthest from the road that runs in front of the building.

He said the unit remained on lockdown, so he couldn’t speak with detainees there, but could in other parts of the center.

“Before we treat that as what happened, I'd rather wait until we can speak to individuals [in Unit 2],” Menendez said.

Menendez said he was told four people were hospitalized with injuries: a fractured hand, a head injury, shortness of breath and an abnormal EKG. He stressed the incident involved Geo Group guards, not ICE personnel.

The statement from Ferreira, the Geo group spokesperson, has said detainees “were promptly evaluated by on-site medical personnel and were cleared with no serious injuries.”

Menendez said the congressmembers confirmed 10 to 12 women, including a woman who’d had a miscarriage while at the center, were moved out on Tuesday and sent to Louisiana. He said detainees told him ICE threatened to transfer out others unless they broke the strike.

ICE has denied using transfers to retaliate against detainees.

‘Getting treated like animals’

Gabriela Fuentes said her husband is being detained at Delaney Hall and is participating in the hunger strike — which ICE and the Department of Homeland Security have consistently denied is taking place, including in a statement sent to Gothamist Thursday. She said her husband described what he witnessed during a phone call with her. Gothamist does not have a way to communicate with detainees inside the center and could not directly confirm the descriptions of their accounts provided by family members and activists.

The situation erupted after officers tried to remove a detainee who spoke English and had been helping to translate documents for others, Gabriela said her husband told her.

“They wanted to take him away,” she told Gothamist. “So all of the prisoners asked to not take him away. So then agents, ICE agents came to the unit and tried to cuff him, and that's when the confrontation started.”

Fuentes said her husband told her that detainees lifted their hands to indicate they didn’t want to fight, but officers began pushing and the situation escalated. She said he told her that they took some prisoners to their cells, deployed pepper spray and closed the doors.

“ And then there were the prisoners banging on the doors to please let them out,” Fuentes said. “My husband says there was blood in the floor and in the walls that clearly the agents now were cleaning up because they knew they messed up.”

Hazel Chavez, 20, a Rutgers University nursing student who lives in Newark, said her father Efren, who has been detained at Delaney Hall for three months, called her around 1:15 pm, saying 20 ICE agents had entered his unit.

The agents attempted to remove a detainee who resisted and was subsequently hit in the face and bleeding. They later deployed tear gas, Chavez said her father told her.

“They’re getting treated like animals, and that’s very inhumane, especially when they tear gas inside,” she said, adding that her father currently has a cold and a cough.

Advocates described similar scenes. Kathy O’Leary, the New Jersey coordinator for the Catholic advocacy group Pax Christi, said her group received messages between 1:30 and 1:40 p.m. saying guards for the GEO Group “were coming through two of the units, beating people with batons and throwing chemical agent canisters into the hallway.”

“The only thing they can do is retreat inside of their rooms,” she said.

Hunger strike continues

Advocates and families say detainees inside Delaney Hall have been on a hunger and labor strike since last Friday, while crowds of supporters demonstrating outside have repeatedly clashed with ICE agents and tried to block vehicles that might transport detainees to other facilities.

Detainees wrote a letter released through advocacy groups Wednesday that most of the hundreds of people kept in the center have a “persistent flu,” the bathrooms are “terrible and inhumane,” and food has been served “containing worms or in a state of decay.”

GEO Group has denied the letter’s claims and other claims of mistreatment. The company said it meets all federal standards, including providing continuous access to medical care and dietician-approved meals.

The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement Thursday no hunger strike is taking place, but that during hunger strikes, ICE continues to provide three meals a day evaluated by dietitians, and drinking water or other beverages to detainees. DHS also said detainees are given clothing, bedding and toiletries, and have access phones to communicate with family and lawyers.

Menendez said Thursday he was told the center was tightening its visitation rules. He said when visitation resumes, detainees would only be allowed visitors from a preapproved list of eight people who’ve provided their date of birth and address.

Local and state officials have struggled to assert any control over the situation. Newark Mayor Ras Baraka has urged state leaders to intervene and inspect the premises. On Thursday, in response to reports of violence inside Delaney Hall, a spokesperson for Gov. Mikie Sherrill reiterated her calls to close the center.

Sherrill said earlier that day the state’s health department had requested access to inspect Delaney Hall, but was only allowed access to a “limited part” of the facility.

“We will review and share the department’s findings from the limited portion it was allowed to inspect, and we will continue to pursue all appropriate avenues for demanding transparency and ensuring humane conditions for the individuals being held at the facility,” Sherrill said in a statement. “As I’ve said repeatedly, refusing to provide full access raises serious questions about what ICE is trying to hide from public view.”

Activists and ICE agents have repeatedly clashed outside the facility, and multiple demonstrators have been arrested. In an altercation Wednesday night, federal agents struck protesters with batons and appeared to push one into the path of a tractor trailer wheel, video from outside the immigration center shows.