THE IMMIGRANT LOCKUP

Thousands of people who are not accused of any crime or who have completed
prison terms for minor crimes spent this Christmas -- and may spend the
next -- in jails around the nation. They are immigrants detained by the
Immigration and Naturalization Service, which has filled its own detention
centers and has now resorted to using local and county lockups.

Hundreds of immigrants who are simply seeking political asylum share cells
with people accused of violent crimes, and are often subject to abuse
because they are foreigners. Keeping them in jails is cruel, unnecessary
and a waste of money.

The detentions have more than doubled since 1995 because Congress now
provides money for the I.N.S. to rent beds in local jails. In addition,
punitive new immigration laws kicked in this year that expand the
categories of immigrants the I.N.S. must detain as they await possible
deportation.

Most of the 16,000 people in detention on any given day are immigrants,
legal as well as illegal, who have committed crimes, including very minor
ones such as marijuana possession or turnstile-jumping, even if their
convictions were long ago. They are held by the I.N.S. after they have
finished their prison terms. Another group comprises illegal immigrants
rounded up in raids on workplaces.

The third group is asylum-seekers. The new immigration laws provide that
everyone who comes to America seeking asylum is detained before a first
interview. Those who pass it are then often detained for months or even
years as they wait for their asylum hearings. Many of them are victims of
torture or other traumatic events whose problems are exacerbated by jail.

The I.N.S. has not been able to assure decent conditions even in the
centers under its control. In 1995 inmates at an I.N.S. detention center in
Elizabeth, N.J., rioted over beatings and the use of shackles. The I.N.S.
later criticized the private company that administered the center, Esmor,
for "inhumane" conditions. Conditions in local jails are often far worse,
and the I.N.S. cannot supervise them. Human Rights Watch has collected
numerous allegations of beatings and other mistreatment. The I.N.S. has
called for a government investigation of alleged torture of immigrants by
electric shock in a Florida jail. Immigrants often have no access to
lawyers or even someone who speaks their language. Worst off are the 1,800
people scheduled for deportations to countries that will not take them
back, such as Cuba. They are jailed indefinitely, some for years.

The main reason for I.N.S. detention is that the vast majority of people at
risk of deportation skip their court dates and simply vanish, given the
chance. The I.N.S. is beginning to study how to get people to keep their
court appointments without locking them up. One pilot project run by the
Vera Institute of Justice, a nonprofit group, keeps immigrants who seem
unlikely to flee out of jail if they check in regularly and receive home
visits from supervisors. Preliminary results show that compliance has
soared -- at one-sixth of the $20,000 per year that detention costs.

The I.N.S. should expand its search for alternatives to detention,
including the use of bail. The 5,000 children detained each year should be
put in group homes or foster care, not juvenile jails. Some people will
require detention, but it should be in centers for immigrants. Congress
should allow the I.N.S. to build its own facilities, which must be strictly
supervised. Above all, the I.N.S. and Congress must abandon their punitive
mentality. It is hard not to suspect that they are trying to deter
immigration by making the process as harrowing as possible.

Checked-by: Richard Lake