The contract between Torrance County and federal immigration authorities to house immigrant detainees at an Estancia jail has been expired now for a week, a lapse that immigrant legal advocates say necessitates detainees’ immediate release.
The Torrance County Detention Facility in Estancia is one of three in New Mexico that has an agreement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to house detainees. But that agreement expired Oct. 31 and has not been renewed, advocates for the detainees and Torrance County Commission Chair Ryan Schwebach told Source New Mexico on Friday.
Ian Philabaum, a program director for Innovation Law Lab, said Friday that the contract’s expiration means ICE and CoreCivic, the private company that owns and operates the jail, no longer can legally hold hundreds of ICE detainees. Innovation Law Lab attorneys conduct weekly legal aid meetings with detainees and also are seeking to shut the facility down.
Philabaum cited a section of ICE’s standard operating procedures that says a contract expiration requires the removal of all detainees and ICE equipment on or before the expiration date.
“CoreCivic and ICE are detaining people in immigration custody without the authority to do so, and because they cannot detain people at [the facility], they should all be released immediately,” he said.
County Manager Jordan Barela did not respond to Source’s calls and emails Friday about the status of the contract. Source’s calls and emails to CoreCivic and ICE officials also were not returned Friday.
Amid the fallout of the contract expiration, Source received an email Friday from Rogelio Izquierdo, a detainee at the facility, who wrote a letter alleging that CoreCivic is continually denying detainees access to their lawyers. Six other detainees signed the letter.
Philabaum confirmed Friday that Izquierdo is one of the nonprofit’s clients but said he wasn’t authorized to comment further about his case. He said Innovation Law Lab also received the letter and confirmed its authenticity.
CoreCivic’s alleged failure to facilitate detainees’ legal assistance denies “access to a fair defense and violate[s] the fundamental principle of equality before the law,” Izquierdo wrote.
The most recent example occurred Thursday, according to the letter, when Izquierdo prepared to meet with his lawyers to collect “important translated documents” he needed for a final court hearing Nov. 13. But Izquierdo said he was never called to meet with his attorneys and then, around 2 p.m., officers told him that his lawyers had already left.
What actually happened, according to Philabaum, is that Innovation Law Lab lawyers had arrived at the facility for their usual Thursday legal appointments but were ordered to leave about 30 minutes afterward.
The reason officers told them to leave, he said, is that they were “investigating” a protest the day before.
According to Philabaum, a few dozen protesters organized into a caravan that drove past the facility on Wednesday. He described it as a peaceful protest over the expired contract, and said he has no idea why CoreCivic would investigate it or use it as a reason to deny legal aid attorneys access.
“The response of ICE and Core Civic, which was clearly coordinated, was to deny access to counsel, which is extremely problematic…and a clear demonstration that it is not business as usual,” at the facility, he said. “They are continuing to ramp up their actions of impunity with respect to how they navigate immigration detention.”
In addition to citing the Thursday legal meeting that CoreCivic canceled, Izquierdo said CoreCivic often abruptly cancels meetings with lawyers without explanation, that detainees don’t have access to the legal library, phone communication does not work well and detainees have little access to pro bono attorneys.
The Estancia detention center has increasingly been at the center of statewide debates about local immigration detention amid President Donald Trump’s mass deportation push.
U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM) in June called for the center to be closed after his staff reported seeing “troubling conditions” during a visit in late May. A local advisory committee to the United States Civil Rights Commission made the same recommendation in September.
According to the latest figures from DetentionReports, the facility now has an average daily population of about 550 detainees, which is about 150 more than earlier this year. Most of them are brought to Estancia from other states, Philabaum said, though some are from New Mexico.
Barela and other county officials have said the center provides “millions of dollars” in salaries to local residents in an otherwise depressed area.
Schwebach, the Commission chair, told Source in a phone interview that he’s growing tired of the controversy, which he said has resulted in threats against his family. He blamed out-of-town activists who he said don’t understand the importance of the facility to the community or ICE’s role in keeping people safe.
“They are not willing to look at the whole picture. And quite honestly, I’m getting tired of it,” he said. “I mean, do we not need any prisons within this country? Is that the end goal?”
