Immigration Authorities Locked 13,000 In Limbo

• There are alternatives to locking up people who would not otherwise be imprisoned if not for their immigration status, ones that would leave the person with his or her family, and cost taxpayers far less than the estimated $95 to $141 per day spent to detain them.
• No Conviction, No Freedom
• Immigrant Detainees Report Nearly 200 Instances Of Sexual Abuse

Elise Foley, Huffington Post

An immigrant stands in a holding cell at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility for illegal immigrants on July 30, 2010 in Florence, Arizona. Most immigrants at the center are awaiting deportation or removal and return to their home countries, while some are interned at the facility while their immigration cases are being reviewed.

On a single day this past fall, the United States government held 13,185 people in immigration detention who had not been convicted of a crime, some of whom will not be charged with one, according to information The Huffington Post obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. Instead, at a cost of roughly 2 million taxpayer dollars per day, the men and women were detained while immigration authorities sorted out their fates.

This case stands in stark contrast to the stated goal of immigration policy under the administration of President Barack Obama: to detain and deport unauthorized immigrants who've been convicted of crimes.

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Related:

Immigrant Detainees Report Nearly 200 Instances Of Sexual Abuse, Elise Foley, Huffington Post
More than 180 sexual abuse complaints have been reported in immigration detention centers since 2007, according to government documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union as part of a class-action suit filed (recently).