FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AMERICAN RIGHTS ASSOCIATION PRESS CONFERENCE
A TEXAS NON-PROFIT CIVIL RIGHTS AND LIBERTIES ORGANIZATION
FELONY CHARGES BY HPD DROPPED AGAINST TWO PROTESTING RAIDS AND CHILDREN'S ILLEGAL DETENTION CONDITIONS AT CORRECTIONS CORPORATION OF AMERICA ICE DETENTION FACILITIES
Two protesters, Ashley Turner, 18, and Benjamin Browning, 24, were being maliciously prosecuted by the Houston Police Department on felony charges for protesting against for-profit Corrections Corporation of America's Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facilities. Today a Harris County Grand Jury recognized the malicious prosecution and dropped the pending felony charges against Ashley and Benjamin.
A federal judge had recently found substantial problems with many types of care provided to children at Correction Corporation of America's facility in Hutto, Texas including children's medical care, nutrition, and privacy. Children are dressed as prisoners there. According to a federal court order, "The living conditions at Hutto seem questionable in general." Judge Sparks found evidence that children were threatened with separation from their parents as a disciplinary tool "most troubling" and likely in violation of legal requirements that children not be subjected to humiliation, mental abuse, or punitive interference with daily living--government-sponsored child abuse.
When Turner and Browning protested the increased immigration raids and conditions at Corrections Corporation of America's detention facilities in Houston by locking themselves to a gate the Houston Police Department falsely claimed ordinary bike locks were felony "criminal instruments" subjecting the protestors to felony prosecution and up to two years in prison. Many Houston police officers are paid by Corrections Corporation of America to do private security and were present at the scene.
The Houston Police Department punished Turner and Browning for speaking out against the treatment of children and increased immigration raids by a for-profit company which employs many HPD officers--a shameful new low for the Houston Police Department which is selling its services to for-profit corporations. The ARA will address City Council concerning CCA's problems at its ICE Houston facility.
DATE: Tuesday, July 3, 2007, 9:30 am.
PLACE: Houston City Council, 901 Bagby, Houston, Texas
CONTACT: Randall Kallinen, President, American Rights Association 713/320-3785; attorneykallinen@aol.com