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ICE Detention Center Workers Sexually Abuse Detained Immigrants

Located in Texas, the Karnes County Residential Center is home to 532 undocumented women and children. The center is one of many ICE detention centers that hold illegal aliens apprehended upon crossing the US-Mexico border. The Geo Group Inc. is the for-profit organization that operates the facility and as well as another 98 correction facilities worldwide.

At the beginning of October, immigration lawyers representing different women detained in the Karnes County Center wrote letters to federal officials detailing allegations of sexual abuse. The letters give details of guards and other detention center workers removing the detainees from their cells for sex, kissing and/or fondling the women in front of other inmates (including children) and even requesting “sexual favors from female detainees in exchange for money, promises of assistance with their pending immigration cases, and shelter when and if the women are released.”

The Geo Group has denied all allegations proclaimed in these letters and says that their center is ‘family-friendly’. Several immigrant advocacy groups are urging US Immigration and Custom Enforcement officials to investigate all allegations of the sexual abuse and for the protection of all the detainees in the facility. ICE gave a written statement saying “Accusations of alleged unlawful conduct are investigated thoroughly and if substantiated, appropriate action is taken”.