The conflict over Delaney Hall is once again spilling into the courts on Tuesday, with state officials suing the company operating the detention center over its refusal to allow state health inspectors full access to the facility, and the mayor of Newark signaling an effort to expand its ongoing litigation against the company.
Raynard Washington, the commissioner of the state Department of Health, filed suit in state court against GEO Group, the private-prison company that operates Delaney Hall, a 1,000-bed immigrant detention center in Newark. Delaney Hall has held Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees for more than a year — illegally, Newark officials argue — and has been the site of recent clashes between protesters and police.
Last week, reports surfaced that detainees had begun a hunger strike over poor living conditions, sparking the ongoing protests. State health inspectors sought access to the building, but Gov. Mikie Sherrill said GEO Group officials only granted access to the kitchen, leading to Tuesday’s lawsuit.
“If the GEO Group — with a $1 billion government contract — has nothing to hide and the conditions inside Delaney Hall are as safe and as sanitary as this private corporation and the Trump Administration claim, then there is no legitimate reason why my health inspectors are being kept from full access throughout the building,” Sherrill said in a release. “The people of New Jersey deserve transparency and accountability, and I will continue using all the power of this office to advocate for the detainees and their families.”
The lawsuit details reports of inconsistent meals, rotten food, inadequate healthcare, a lack of necessary toiletries, and broken air conditioning. ICE and Republican officials have rejected the reports, saying detainees receive high-quality food and safe living conditions.
The filing states that GEO Group has not allowed a full inspection of the site until at least last spring.
GEO Group did not immediately return a request for comment.
The state’s lawsuit asks a judge to quickly require GEO Group to open all of Delaney Hall to state health inspectors.
Last week, a doctor at University Hospital in Newark reported that an inmate had been taken from Delaney Hall to the hospital with an active case of Tuberculosis. The case does not appear to have been reported publicly. The doctor asked the health department to examine Delaney Hall’s infection control practices, according to the lawsuit.
“Any facility housing people in New Jersey must meet basic standards under the law to prevent the spread of disease, keep food and water safe, and minimize health risks. That includes Delaney Hall,” Washington said. “The New Jersey Department of Health takes seriously its mission to safeguard the health and well-being of everyone in this state. Health inspections are not political — they are essential public health tools that help ensure no one in New Jersey is housed in dangerous or unsanitary conditions.”
The state lawsuit came a couple of hours after Newark Mayor Ras Baraka announced his intentions to expand a lawsuit that his city had been leading against GEO Group for more than a year. City officials have long maintained that GEO Group is operating Delaney Hall without the proper certificates and inspections.
Baraka said he is maintaining his focus on ensuring the people detained in Delaney Hall are safe and healthy.
“What we are most concerned about is that the public conversation has shifted away from what matters most: the urgent issues, not just what’s happening outside of Delaney Hall,” Baraka said.
The city hasn’t yet filed its updated arguments on the docket. The litigation has continued for more than a year, with most negotiations happening behind closed doors. The case went into mediation in April, and the parties face a June 15 deadline to complete the process.
“[Delaney Hall] has no real grounds to be open,” Baraka said. “It should be closed on the grounds that we stated in the first place, and we are going to argue even further that this should be closed because of health and human safety.”
Baraka said the facility is subject to state and local laws because GEO Group operates Delaney Hall.
“GEO is a private company [that] is hiding under the auspices of a contract that they have with the federal government. The federal government has no employees that work here. This is not a federal facility; it’s a non-federal grounds, it’s a private facility with private workers, and they are subject to state and municipal laws.”
The City of Newark largely took over police operations outside of Delaney Hall on Monday after a few days of N.J. State Police control. After dozens of arrests on Sunday evening, Baraka said Newark police arrested nobody on Monday night. He said city officials met with Sherrill and state Attorney General Jennifer Davenport in an effort to gain a “louder voice” in the chaos.
“We expect their assistance and their help,” Baraka said. “We just want to be able to control what is happening in our city.”
The city established a curfew in the half-mile area surrounding Delaney Hall early Sunday morning, and Baraka said he plans to lift that curfew today or tomorrow. State officials said the curfew was needed as demonstrators hurled projectiles and set a small fire in the street near Delaney Hall.
Baraka said that Sherrill was correct to make a “strong and aggressive” decision in handling the clashes between protesters and federal officers, but he publicly took issue with some of the tactics used by state police. And he accused ICE agents of escalating tensions outside of Delaney Hall, which eventually led to the scuffles and arrests.
In addition to federal agents, Sherrill and Davenport have accused out-of-state agitators of stoking tension, criticizing the use of shields and gas masks. Sherrill has repeatedly argued that a strong police response was needed to prevent ICE from having a “pretext” to surge into the state.
At various points, state police or federal agents used pepper spray, tear gas, batons, and riot shields, and some state troopers approached protesters on horseback.
“The state police is a sword,” Baraka said. “If you’re going to use them, you have to expect people to get cut, and that’s the thinking that has to go into this. We, going forward, have to have larger discussions about tactics on the ground.”
“The Newark Police would be under a consent decree again if we behaved that way,” he said.
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October 25, 2018