Joanne Elgart Jennings: When attorney Homero Lopez needs to meet in person with clients held in immigration detention, he has to make long drives from his home in New Orleans. 

 

Homero Lopez: If you do a day trip, you're talking about six to eight hours of drive, not including the time that you're physically there.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: His non-profit, Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy, provides free legal representation for migrants detained in Louisiana. And with more and more detention centers being opened in rural areas, he spends a lot of time in his car.

 

Homero Lopez: There's a limited amount of people who are doing the detained cases in Louisiana because it is, they are so far, so rural, so difficult to get to and to handle.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: Most of Lopez’s clients are at the Pine Prairie ICE Processing Center. It’s 180 miles northwest of New Orleans and holds up to 1,094 detainees. Though it’s a federal facility, it’s run and staffed by GEO Group, a private prison company that contracts with the US government. GEO declined our request to tour the detention center, but we were permitted to enter the visitation area and meet some of Lopez’s clients. Thirty-two-year-old Cristian De Leon has been in ICE custody for fourteen months. A native of Guatemala, DeLeon came to the US on a work visa, which has since expired. He was living in Alabama with his fiancé and their three children and working in construction.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: How did you end up here in ICE detention in Louisiana? 

 

Cristian De Leon: I had a small car accident and the police came to help me and then they arrested me.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: DeLeon was charged with driving under the influence. He says when his fiance came to pay his bond, the police wouldn’t let her. 

 

Cristian De Leon: They said that ICE was already coming for me. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: ICE issued a deportation order, which DeLeon is appealing. Meanwhile, he married his fiance, an American citizen, in a brief prison ceremony. He’s now applying for a green card as her spouse. DeLeon is not typical of Lopez’s clients. Most have applied for asylum because they feared for their lives in their home country. Like thirty-six-year old Jamal Jamal, who came to the US from Pakistan. He says he had fallen in love with a woman whose family had arranged a marriage for her with another man. When the woman told her family she wanted to marry Jamal instead, they killed her. A tribal council then ordered Jamal’s execution, so he fled the country.  

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: What do you think will happen if you are deported back to Pakistan?

 

Jamal Jamal: They might kill me. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: On arrival in the U.S., he asked for asylum. He’s been in ICE detention for eleven months as his case makes its way through immigration court. Katie Schwartzmann is Legal Director of the American Civil Liberties Union in Louisiana. She says that migrants like Jamal, who enter the U.S. legally seeking asylum, and demonstrate a “credible fear” of returning to their home country, should be released on bond.

 

Katie Schwartzmann: They're entitled to consideration for something that our immigration law calls "humanitarian parole", which means the right to remain out in the community in the United States as ICE considers whether the grant of asylum is appropriate. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: ICE’s regional office in New Orleans is responsible for five southern states, including Louisiana. As recently as 2016, under the Obama administration, it approved parole for almost 76% of asylum cases. Under the Trump Administration, that number has plunged to 1.5%. The ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center have filed suit against the Department of Homeland Security. They allege that ICE’s New Orleans office is categorically denying parole to asylum seekers in “a violation of DHS’s own directive and guidelines.” A federal judge agreed, noting in September that the number of parole approvals had dropped to zero percent in 2019.  He ruled that DHS must consider granting parole to detainees seeking asylum. The government is appealing the ruling. ICE officials say parole is designed to be narrowly applied. Bryan Cox is acting press secretary.

 

Bryan Cox: The reality is that if people could show up at the border, make a claim, and be released into the interior of the united states, not everyone will then appear in court. And so detention in some instances is a necessary use of resources to ensure that persons do in fact appear in court.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: But over the past year, ICE has held more migrants in detention than ever before. And many are here in Louisiana. Last year there were two prisons, holding about 2,500 ICE detainees. Now, there are eleven holding almost 9,000 people. Detained migrants are less likely to win asylum than those who await trial on the outside. Homero Lopez’s clients are among the lucky few who have legal representation.

 

Homero Lopez: Buenos dias, Dixan. Como estas?

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: On this day, Lopez is meeting with Dixan Hernandez Naranjo via video conference. Not all detention centers allow the practice. They are trying to prepare for the tough questioning Hernandez will face in an asylum hearing the next day.

 

Homero Lopez: Le mentiste a ICE?

 

Dixan Hernandez Naranjo: No. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: In his native Cuba, Hernandez was a tour guide. He says government officials accused him of speaking unpatriotically to tourists, and jailed him repeatedly for what he calls “thought crimes.” While in ICE detention at Pine Prairie, Hernandez  participated in a hunger strike. He says he and his fellow protesters were being unfairly incarcerated.

 

Dixan Hernandez Naranjo: We are not criminals. We just simply want to fight for our rights, like anybody who comes to seek asylum.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: He was placed in solitary confinement for his participation and missed a meeting with Lopez. Now, they are having one last session before the hearing. The next morning, Lopez makes a three-and-a-half-hour drive to Oakdale, a small town in central Louisiana, which is mostly comprised of a strip of chain stores. Tucked inside a federal correctional complex is the nondescript Oakdale Immigration Court. It handles all cases for migrants detained at Pine Prairie. Lopez is here to present Hernandez’s asylum case. He’s hopeful, but he knows the odds are not in his client’s favor. 

 

Homero Lopez: Our judges have a very low approval rate for relief for asylum in particular. And um, we just don't see a lot of wins unfortunately. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: From 2013 to 2018, judges at this court denied asylum nearly 90 percent of the time. But Lopez and his law partner Al Page have beaten the odds lately. They won five out of eight asylum cases while we were in Louisiana. Among the wins: Dixan Herndandez Naranjo. We caught up with him at the bus station in New Orleans shortly after he was released from detention. Hernandez says he’s grateful to be out in what he calls “a country with freedom.” But he says the treatment he received in detention, especially in solitary confinement, was not what he expected in the United States. 

 

Dixan Hernandez Naranjo: The same experience when I've been in the hole was like the same thing when I'm in the hole in cuba. Maybe more dangerous than Cuba.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: Jamal Jamal and Cristian DeLeon remain in ICE detention. A judge recently denied Jamal’s application for asylum. He decided to appeal the decision rather than be deported immediately. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: DeLeon has fallen ill and is being tested for a heart condition.

 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: Jackson Parish is typical of Northern Louisiana. Rural, quiet, conservative, and close-knit. Also typical are shuttered stores, a symptom of a stagnant economy and the struggle to employ people. One reliable employer has been the Jackson Parish Correctional Center. The jail is operated by Lasalle Corrections, a local private prison company, but it’s managed and under the jurisdiction of the sheriff’s department. Andy Brown was elected sheriff of Jackson Parish in 2003.

 

Sheriff Andy Brown: One of the things that I faced when I took over, we had a jail that was built in 1936. The conditions were horrible and I knew I had to close that jail and try to come up with something that would benefit our Parish. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: So he reached out to Lasalle Corrections.

 

Sheriff Andy Brown: After many meetings, many discussions, a lot of negotiation, we agreed that Lasalle would come here and build this facility. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: They built a jail with capacity to hold 600 inmates and later more than double that. The population of Jackson Parish is about 15,000.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: So why does a parish your size need a jail so big?

 

Sheriff Andy Brown: Well, it necessarily did not need a jail this size, but in our negotiations with Lasalle Management, I wanted a Parish jail and one thing that I have to tell you this prison did not cost the taxpayers any money. Lasalle Management come in and built this. And you know, they're going to build it on a scale to where it fits their needs, not necessarily mine. They're in the business of making money. I'm not necessarily in the business of making money. I'm in the business of making sure this operates right and it carries on like it's supposed to. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: Historically, Louisiana has been known as America’s incarceration capital. Overcrowding in its prisons has led the state to rely on local sheriffs, working in partnership with for-profit companies. Together, they’ve built large facilities to house more than half of the state’s prisoners. 

 

Katie Schwartzmann: The way that we pay local sheriffs is on a per diem system, which means that they're paid per head, per day, for each individual that they house. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: Katie Schwartzmann is Legal Director for the American Civil Liberties Union in Louisiana.

 

Katie Schwartzmann:  Well, that incentivizes economically incarcerating the most people that you can and saving as much money as you can on things like services and basic provisions. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: The arrangement has provided a boost to economically depressed rural communities while increasing profits for the private companies. But in 2017, Louisiana enacted prison reforms that led to a dramatic decrease in the number of state prisoners behind bars. Now, many of the cells are being used by ICE. The agency pays the Jackson Parish Sheriff’s department $74 a day for each migrant detainee. That’s about three times what the state pays to house someone convicted of a crime. Though the $74 does cover some added ICE requirements, including translators and additional healthcare providers, it’s been a windfall here.

 

Sheriff Andy Brown: The per diem comes to the sheriff's office and I turn around and cut Lasalle Management a check. Then Lasalle Management pays me. They reimburse me for all the benefits for all the salaries of all these employees. Plus, I make some money off of fees and such.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: And when you say you make money that you're able to finance your law enforcement operation through, through this? Or what do you mean?

 

Sheriff Andy Brown: I have about a five million dollar budget at my sheriff's office. And this year we will probably profit seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars from the jail.                                                        

Joanne Elgart Jennings: And Brown says there are other economic benefits.

 

Sheriff Andy Brown: I've been able to create over 200 jobs and it's very meaningful in our parish. And these jobs, not only the pay but they get health benefits. And so I'm proud of that fact. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: What Sheriff Brown sees as a boon to the community troubles the ACLU’s Katie Schwartzmann.

 

Katie Schwartzmann: Our local sheriffs have figured out that they can make more money on housing ICE detainees than they can on housing, um convicted Louisiana prisoners.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: So there's some people that say like you're profiting off of incarcerating people. What do you say to people who say that?

 

Sheriff Andy Brown: I've got mixed emotions about that. I do understand why somebody would say that. And you know again I'm not in it for the profit. I'm in it to better the area where I live.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: ICE says its arrangement with Louisiana benefits federal taxpayers. Bryan Cox is acting press secretary. 

 

Bryan Cox: The average cost of detention in ICE custody is around $126 a day. The average in Louisiana is about $65 a day. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: And Cox says there's a reason ICE contracts with local sheriffs and prison companies.

 

Bryan Cox: If ice were to build and operate a network of detention facilities, ICE would have to staff those facilities, build those facilities. The cost to the taxpayer would be significant. With a contract arrangement that allows ICE to bring on more beds as needed, reduce beds as needed.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: On the day we visited Jackson Parish Correctional Center, 972 beds were occupied by ICE detainees. We met three who each entered the U.S. at legal ports of entry and requested asylum. All are gay men from Central America. They say they were persecuted by gangs, often violently, and met with indifference by the police. Twenty-three-year-old Sergio Gomez is from El Salvador.

 

Sergio Gomez: I've had a lot of problems with the gangs because of my sexual preference.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: He’s been in ICE detention for nine months, which he says is especially trying as a gay man.

 

Sergio Gomez: It's real hard to be locked up in a dorm with a hundred men. We don't have privacy. We all take showers together. We're ashamed and embarrassed.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: The ACLU’s Katie Schwartzmann says what concerns her about using jails to detain migrants awaiting asylum hearings is that they’re being treated as criminals.

 

Katie Schwartzmann: Immigration detainees are civil detainees. They're not accused of any crime, um, they don't have a right to a lawyer in the way that somebody on the criminal side is because it's treated as a civil infraction. Now you have those civil detainee folks being housed in the exact same conditions of confinement that historically we've housed people who are convicted of criminal offenses in Louisiana.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: I raised that concern with Sheriff Brown.

 

Sheriff Andy Brown: And I understand that and um, I still think that we're a nation of laws and we've got to we've got to protect our borders. We've got to secure our borders. I don't know that a wall is the answer, and I hate to say this, but incarceration may be.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: Whatever the case, incarceration will continue to fuel the economies of towns like Sheriff Brown’s if Sergio Gomez is any indication.

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: If you could do it again, would you still try to seek asylum?

 

Sergio Gomez: I’d rather be locked up because I cannot return back. 

 

Joanne Elgart Jennings: You would rather be in jail here than go back home?

 

Sergio Gomez: I'd prefer to be locked up than return back to my country. 

 

##

 

	TIMECODE	LOWER THIRD
1	00:41	HOMERO LOPEZ, JR. IMMIGRATION ATTORNEY
2	04:34	BRYAN COX U.S. IMMIGRATION & CUSTOMS ENFORCEMENT
3	01:28	ANDY BROWN SHERIFF, JACKSON PARISH
4	02:34	KATIE SCHWARTZMANN AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION
5	03:32	ANDY BROWN SHERIFF, JACKSON PARISH
6	04:57	ANDY BROWN SHERIFF, JACKSON PARISH
7	05:32	BRYAN COX U.S. IMMIGRATION & CUSTOMS ENFORCEMENT
8	06:46	KATIE SCHWARTZMANN AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION