Guards at MDC Brooklyn federal jail, known for its horrific conditions and widespread violence, barred an immigration attorney from visiting ICE detainees, telling her they do not have a procedure in place to make the visits happen.
Paige Austin, an attorney with nonprofit group Make the Road New York, told the News she was turned away when attempting to visit a handful of Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees at the Sunset Park lockup early Thursday afternoon.
After going through security and waiting in an attorney room for almost a half hour, a guard told Austin the people she wanted to see could not have legal visits, as they had not yet received “guidance” on how to facilitate them.
“It’s bullsh*t. They figured out a system to put them there. They figured out a system to process them into Federal Bureau of Prisons custody. They figured out a system to have them appear in immigration court on video,” Austin said.
Austin said the guard also mentioned they had turned away a second immigration attorney on Wednesday.
“The idea that in this very built up part of Brooklyn there’s this jail into which possibly 100 people have vanished and have no access to counsel and cannot be contacted, is incongruous and deeply disturbing,” Austin said.
Before being turned away at the jail, Austin said it was an uphill battle just to determine where the detainees were being held. ICE’s ‘online detainee locator’ generated results for the searched detainees, confirming they were in custody, however, no current detention facility was listed for them, Austin said.
“The ICE locator is not updating people’s location. That’s an endemic problem right now,” she said.
Obtained by Daily News
In a screenshot provided by an attorney, the ICE detainee locator website did not display a current location for a detainee. (Obtained by Daily News)
It was only when a colleague of Austin’s searched these detainees’ names in the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ (BOP) detainee lookup that they determined they were being held at MDC. Family members also confirmed when their detained loved ones called and told them they were there.
Sources previously told the News that between 100 and 120 ICE detainees have already been placed in the jail’s “East Building,” and for the most part aren’t mingling with pretrial inmates accused of dangerous crimes.
“These are people who need to make really fast decisions. People in expedited removal can have the whole process play out in a week or two. So if people are being hidden and warehoused inside of MDC Brooklyn, without access to counsel, that is going to be determinative of the outcome of their case,” Austin said.
Attorneys can help detainees prepare for a credible fear interview— a screening process used by ICE to determine whether someone subject to expedited removal has a credible fear of persecution if they return to their home country.
“People tell their story in a way that reflects their lived experience, and it takes talking to a lawyer to draw out the relevant pieces for purposes of an asylum claim,” Austin explained. “So if you don’t have that call or two [legal] calls, and then you have your fear interview, you very well might fail, and you might not have failed if an attorney could talk with you.”
“It’s not like it’s a problem that can be fixed in six months when they move somewhere else, the result would be wrongful deportation,” Austin said.
The MDC Brooklyn New York City Field Office page on the ICE website states that “legal representatives of detainees are authorized to visit their clients”, from 7:30 a.m. until 12 p.m. on weekdays.
The page also states attorneys can call a phone number to arrange legal calls. Austin said she called the number Friday morning aiming to arrange calls with several detainees and had not heard back hours later.
“BOP apparently agreed to take 100 ICE detainees at MDC Brooklyn without making any plan for providing them with legal access,” Dierdre von Dornum of the Federal Defenders said Friday. “Their lawyers have already been denied in-person visits, contrary to ICE’s own detention standards, and are being told by DOJ to call a general ICE number to seek legal calls, which is the equivalent of calling the DMV for information.”
“This is just a further indication that MDC is not prepared to honor people’s constitutional rights, whether pre-trial detainees or ICE detainees,” von Dornum continued.
When asked if ICE detainees are allowed in-person visits with lawyers, and if there is a procedure in place for said visits, a BOP spokesman replied Friday with a statement only confirming they are holding ICE detainees at MDC, without addressing the News’ questions.
ICE officials did not immediately reply to requests for comment on Friday.
Staff at MDC Brooklyn regularly facilitate legal visits for their detainees, including criminal defendants held in the Special Administrative Measures, or SAMS unit. These individuals are considered dangerous and are not allowed to have any unmonitored contact with others. Among those defendants are Asif Merchant, who is accused of being part of an Iran-backed plot to kill President Trump, and Mexican drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero.
Veteran defense attorney Avraham Moskowitz, who reps Merchant, said the jail and ICE are interfering with and refusing to acknowledge the ICE detainees’ right to counsel.
“They have rights. They’re in this country, and if you’re in this country you have rights. Period. End of discussion. The constitution applies to you,” Moskowitz said. “The fact that this administration continues to ignore that and getting away with it on occasion, it’s a sad commentary.”
MDC has had issues facilitating legal visits for regular detainees in the past, leading a federal judge to assign a court-appointed mediator to facilitate detainee visits for Federal Defenders lawyers in 2020.
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