ICE officers stuck in Djibouti shipping container with deported migrants
Three officers and eight detainees arrived at
the only US military base in Africa
unprepared for what awaited them. Defense officials warned them of 'imminent danger of rocket attacks from terrorist groups in Yemen,' but the ICE officers did not pack body armor or other gear to protect themselves. Temperatures soar past 100 degrees during the day. At night, she wrote, a 'smog cloud' forms in the windless sky, filled with rancid smoke from nearby burning pits where residents incinerate trash and human waste.
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The Trump administration has urged the Supreme Court to stay Murphy's April order requiring screenings under the Convention Against Torture, which Congress ratified in 1994 to bar the US government from sending people to countries where they might face torture. In a filing in that case Thursday, officials told the Supreme Court that Murphy's order violates their authority to deport immigrants to third countries if their homelands refuse to take them back, particularly if they are serious offenders who might otherwise be released in the United States.
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Officials said the conditions in Djibouti highlight the dangers of Murphy's order.
'A small number of ICE personnel are currently guarding dangerous criminals around-the-clock in a converted conference room, under threat of rocket attacks and other security and health hazards — disrupting the base's operations, consuming critical resources intended for service members, and harming national security,' Solicitor General D. John Sauer said in the filing.
In her declaration, Harper said officers and detainees began to suffer symptoms of a bacterial upper respiratory infection soon after deplaning, including 'coughing, difficulty breathing, fever, and achy joints.'
Medication wasn't immediately available. She wrote that the flight nurse has since obtained treatments such as inhalers, Tylenol, eye drops, and nasal spray, but they cannot get tested for the illness to properly treat it.
'It is unknown how long the medical supply will last,' Harper wrote.
The officers spend their days guarding eight immigrants convicted of crimes that include murder, attempted murder, sex offenses, and armed robbery, court records show. Harper
said Defense Department employees 'have expressed frustration' about staying in close proximity to violent offenders.
Harper said ICE has had to deploy more officers available to work in 'deleterious' conditions to give the initial crew a break. Currently 11 officers are assigned to guard the immigrants and two others 'support the medical staff,' she said. They work 12-hour shifts guarding immigrants, taking them to get medication and to use the restroom and the shower in a nearby trailer, one at a time. Officers pat down the detainees, searching them for contraband.
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At night and on breaks, officers sleep on bunk beds in a trailer, with one storage locker apiece. Some wear N95 masks even while they sleep because the air
is so polluted
it irritates their throats and makes it difficult to breathe. The area is dimly lit, which Harper wrote poses a security risk to the officers.
Department of Homeland Security officials seized on the court filings to criticize the judge.
'This Massachusetts District judge is putting the lives of our ICE law enforcement in danger by stranding them in [Djibouti] without proper resources, lack of medical care, and terrorists who hate Americans running rampant,' said DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin on X. 'Our @ICEgov officers were only supposed to transport for removal 8 *convicted criminals* with *final deportation orders* who were so monstrous and barbaric that no other country would take them. This is reprehensible and, quite frankly, pathological.'
But a lawyer for the detainees said they are also worried about their health, whether they are shackled and, the circumstances that DHS has created for them.
'We're increasingly concerned about the conditions of the detainees,' said Trina Realmuto, an attorney for the deportees.
Murphy had said DHS abruptly launched the deportation flight even though it plainly violated his April 18 preliminary injunction barring them from removing people without due process. Federal law prohibits sending anyone — even criminals — to countries where they might be persecuted or tortured.
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Although McLaughlin said officials couldn't deport them to their home countries, Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum said at a news conference last month that the US government did not inform her of the Mexican national sent to Djibouti, Jesus Munoz Gutierrez, who was convicted of second-degree murder in Florida 20 years ago, court records show.
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