Friday, May 30, 2014

U.S. Releases Hundreds of Illegal Migrants Due to Lack of Space in Detention Centers

5/30/2014

TUCSON, Arizona – Hundreds of undocumented immigrants detained in Texas are being freed under supervision in Arizona because the detention centers in the Lone Star State do not have enough space for them due to an avalanche of immigrants entering illegally from Mexico.

The immigrants are arriving in federal government vehicles at a bus station in downtown Tucson and are being released under the condition that they contact Immigration and Customs Enforcement to fix a date to begin their deportation procedures, although there are serious doubts about whether any of them will actually do that.

“We have seen how each day between 50 and 70 people are arriving in buses from Texas,” Daniel Wilson, a volunteer with the Casa Mariposa organization, told Efe.

“We have heard that the ICE and Border Patrol substations are completely filled and there’s no place to take all these people. We’ve spoken with people who went to Texas and they’ve brought them to Arizona, and now their families must buy them the return ticket to Texas,” he said.

In some cases, immigrants cannot contact their families to ask them to purchase a ticket back home for them and Casa Mariposa is offering people in this situation shelter while they make the arrangements to continue their trips.

A report by the Border Patrol in Texas to which Efe gained access shows that immigration movement has shifted from other zones along the southern border to this state, where in just one day authorities detain almost the number of people detained in a month in Arizona.

Since the beginning of the 2014 fiscal year, which began last October 1, more than 100,000 people have been detained in Texas.

“Over the Memorial Day weekend more than 400 people were released,” ICE spokesperson Amber Cargile told Efe on Thursday.


source

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