ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — There still are no protocols for attorneys to get in touch with clients at the immigration detention center known as “Alligator Alcatraz,” and detainees are often transferred just before scheduled lawyer visits, according to new court papers alleging continued unconstitutional obstacles for meeting with legal representatives.
Thursday’s court papers were filed in response to a transfer from Miami to Fort Myers of the federal lawsuit claiming detainees have been denied private meetings with immigration attorneys while being held at the facility built by the state of Florida in the Everglades wilderness.
It also comes a week after a federal appellate court panel, in a separate environmental lawsuit, allowed operations to continue at the detention center by putting on hold a lower court’s preliminary injunction ordering the facility to wind down by the end of October. A third federal lawsuit challenging practices at the facility claims immigration is a federal issue and Florida agencies and the private contractors hired by the state have no authority to operate the facility.
“Detained individuals have a First Amendment right to communicate with their attorneys in confidence,” lawyers said Thursday in the legal rights case.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement continues to omit information about detainees at the facility from its online locator system “so attorneys cannot confirm whether detained clients are held at the facility.” During videoconferences with their lawyers, detainees are placed in cages that aren’t soundproof with staff in earshot, and documents for clients are subject to review by staff, the attorneys said.
Wasn’t that place supposed to be closed down by now? Or at least empty?