By
Cat Viglienzoni - July 26, 2010
A new report claims thousands of mentally-disabled
immigrants are caught in deportation proceedings they don't understand, leaving
them defenseless and stuck in the system.
According to "Deportation by Default," the report by the
American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch, shortcomings include no
right to appointed legal counsel, inflexible detention policies, inadequate guidance
for judges on handling those mental disabilities, and poor coordination for
services aiding detainees in custody.
Human Rights Watch investigator and lead author of the
study Sarah Mehta said using a conservative estimate, fifteen percent of the
392,000 immigration cases processed by the courts involved people with mental
disabilities. Those people, she said, could not adequately defend themselves.
"They didn't know what the charges were against them or
why they were in the detention facility or how long it would go on for," she
said. "When I asked them what questions the judges asked them they said they
didn't know."
Mehta said some of the people who don't know basic
information are going through some of the most complicated legal proceedings
without a automatic right to court-appointed counsel, putting them in danger of
being deported.
"A lot of people can't even provide really basic
information about themselves, like what their name is or what country they were
born in, where they are right now or what a court is, and those individuals are
going forward in a proceeding where they could be deported, even when they have
a legal claim to be in the United States, even if they might be U.S. citizens,"
she said.
Federal agencies are aware of the problems cited in the
report, and Mehta said she has been cautiously encouraged by some recent
developments to handle people with mental disabilities during immigration
proceedings. But there is still a long way to go, and the report urges new
measures, such as appointing lawyers for those determined to have mental
disabilities and mandatory training for judges to be able to identify mental
disabilities.
"No one knows what to do with detainees with mental
disabilities, so every part of the immigration system has abdicated
responsibility," Mehta said. "The result is people languishing in
detention for years while their legal files - and their lives - are transferred
around or put on indefinite hold."
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is in
charge of arresting and detaining people facing deportation, said they are implementing
changes, such as taking steps to identify those with mental disabilities and
finding alternatives to detention for those who do not pose a public threat.
They will also host a national forum seeking input from medical health
professionals.
(Photo
courtesy: AP Images)
