| Andrea Castillo of the LA Times reported: ICE deliberately limited testing at Bakersfield immigration facility with COVID-19 outbreak. The San Francisco Public Defender’s Office is part of a class action suit against ICE and GEO Group for conditions in immigration detention centers during the COVID-19 pandemic, in partnership with the ACLU of Northern and Southern California, the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights, Lakin & Wille LLP, and Cooley LLP. Attorneys for the plaintiffs issued a joint press release after they discovered email exchanges showing that ICE and GEO Group deliberately avoided testing people for coronavirus to avoid having to properly re-house those who would test positive. |
“ICE continues to demonstrate its failure to act to prevent a COVID crisis, which has devastating consequences to those in its custody,” said San Francisco’s Public Defender Mano Raju. “This is particularly unconscionable as Mesa Verde is currently facing an entirely preventable COVID outbreak.” – press release 8/6/20
