News
Lawmakers Seek Greater Protection for Jailed Immigrants
by Bob Hennelly
NEW YORK, NY May 06, 2008 — Lawmakers want stronger oversight of how immigration detainees in federal custody are treated. This, after last year's death of an undocumented man from Guinea detained in New Jersey.
The death of 52-year-old Boubacar Bah after a scull fracture, as well as 70 other detainee deaths across the country since 2004, has Sen. Robert Menendez calling for greater scrutiny of the federal agency that held them.
MENENDEZ: We are responsible for their lives and even if someone committed a violation of immigration law their detention should not end up in a death sentence.
A spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement said that the Bah case had been thoroughly investigated and is now closed.
She said that the rate of mortality for ICE detainees was well below that of the US prison population and the nation as a whole - noting that in the same time period that 71 detainees died, over a million others had passed through the federal immigration detention system.
For WNYC, I'm Bob Hennelly.
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