Judge orders release of migrants in Florida as virus measure

MIAMI — A federal judge ordered authorities to release hundreds of immigrants from three Florida detention centres to prevent a wider spread of the coronavirus and protect detainees with underlying conditions.

U.S. District Court Judge Marcia Cooke issued an order late Thursday for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement to begin the steps to bring down the number of detainees from 1,400 to about 350 within two weeks.

Two others orders were also issued on Thursday by federal judges in California and Louisiana siding with groups seeking the release of immigrants at high risk.

In Miami, seven detainees at the Krome Detention Center have tested positive for COVID-19. And court filings state at least eight staff members have been infected at the same detention centre.

The judge said she found violations of the Fifth and Eight Amendments that protect due process and against unusual punishment as conditions are worsening each day at Krome and authorities have failed at practicing social distancing at one of the other facilities.

“These failures have placed petitioners at a heightened risk of not only contracting COVID-19, but also succumbing to the fatal effects of the virus as some of the petitioners have serious underlying medical illness,” Cook wrote in the document. “Such failures amount to cruel and unusual punishment because they are exemplary of deliberate indifference.”

ICE was ordered to submit a report Sunday with the steps to release detainees. Cooke also gave ICE two days to give masks to every detainee at the three Florida facilities, in Miami, Broward County and Glades County.

Immigrant rights groups celebrated the judge’s decision on Friday, saying there was no justification to keep immigrants fighting civil matters behind bars in the middle of a pandemic.

“By ignoring the advice of doctors and public health experts, the agency is knowingly putting detained peoples’ lives in grave danger,” said Paul R. Chavez, an attorney for the Southern Poverty Law Center. “Their wholly unnecessary detention has led to catastrophic outbreaks that will soon burden an already strained health care system.”

An ICE spokesman said he could not speak specifically about the lawsuit as litigation is pending. The agency says it reviews releases on a case-by-case basis and has released nearly 700 people from custody due to the spread of the coronavirus.

SPLC and other groups filed the complaint on April 13 seeking the immediate release of detainees at three Florida facilities saying they were at risk of infection because officials were not following guidelines to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

According to testimonies from detainees cited in the complaint, there is not enough soap and some said they had not received masks or gloves even after asking for the equipment. Some men said they continue to be close to people with flu-like symptoms because of cell and sleeping arrangements.

Adriana Gomez Licon, The Associated Press