"I don’t care if it’s Guantanamo Bay. We want to fill the beds.”

by Dave Bennion · 2009-08-04 22:48:00 UTC
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Today's title comes from this piece from Maria Muentes at Families For Freedom:

Recently, the Donald Wyatt Center in Rhode Island lost its contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to house 153 immigrant prisoners after the horrific death of a detainee. Center representatives publicly bemoaned the loss of $100,000 per week and quickly began looking for a way to get more prisoners. The chairman of the board for the center, Daniel Cooney, said, “Frankly, I’m looking at it like I’m running a Motel 6. I don’t care if it’s Guantanamo Bay. We want to fill the beds.” He was eventually fired in the fallout from this remark, but his candor is revealing. Immigrant prisoners are valuable commodities to local jails. This approach boosts the economies of private prison companies and municipalities but costs the federal government millions—perhaps billions—of dollars.

That is the big picture.

But read the stories of Roger, Ravi, and Robert included in the piece to get a sense of what these policies mean to individuals and families caught up in this meatgrinder.

(Remembering for a moment the life of Hiu Lui Ng, the computer engineer who died in excruciating pain at Donald Wyatt after his spine shattered due to untreated cancer, accused of faking his illness and mistreated by his captors--this is the regard with which ICE holds human life.  That is the backstory to Wyatt's closure and Daniel Cooney's "Motel 6" comment.)

Dave Bennion
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