Law Enforcement Officers Respond to Reports of Unrest at Migrant Facility
Dozens of law enforcement officials from several policing agencies responded on Thursday to a private immigration detention center in Newark after reports of a disturbance inside.
Masked officers carrying plastic handcuffs and pepper spray could be seen entering the facility, known as Delaney Hall, just after 7 p.m., and people standing nearby reported smelling a pungent odor.
Earlier on Thursday, Amy Torres, the director of the New Jersey Alliance for Immigrant Justice, said two calls came in on the alliance's emergency hotline from detainees. Relatives with scheduled appointments had not been permitted inside to visit, she said, and detainees were complaining about meager amounts of food and water over the past day.
Delaney Hall is run by one of the country's largest private prison companies, the GEO Group, which has a contract with the Trump administration to hold as many as 1,000 migrants at a time. Last month, a clash outside the facility led the Justice Department to charge Representative LaMonica McIver, a New Jersey Democrat, with assault. Ms. McIver, who has maintained her innocence, is scheduled to be arraigned on Monday and has said that she will enter a not-guilty plea.
A spokesman for the GEO Group referred questions to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, said she was in touch with officials at the facility but was not able to offer an immediate comment.
Relatives who had scheduled appointments to visit detainees were gathered outside on Thursday afternoon when a fire truck and then police vehicles from several agencies, including the Newark Police Department and the Essex County Sheriff Department, pulled up.
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