Official Report Slams
Detainee Abuse
FBI, Justice Dept. Faulted
by Aarti Shahani
On June 2 the Justice Department's internal watchdog unit, the Office
of the Inspector General (OIG), released a scathing report detailing a
"pattern of physical and verbal abuse" suffered by 762 South
Asian, Arab and Muslim immigrants detained since Sept. 11. The report,
submitted by Inspector General Glenn Fine, documents how immigrants were
unfairly rounded up, beaten, refused contact with lawyers and family,
and unnecessarily imprisoned for months.
The 239-page document says that the FBI "made little attempt to
distinguish" between immigrants with alleged terrorist ties and those
swept up by chance in the investigation. It contends that without the
Sept. 11 attacks "most if not all" of the arrests would not
have been pursued.
Detainee Shanaz Mohammed told the New York Times, "We were all looked
at as terrorists. We were abused." Not one of the 762 Arabs and Muslims
detainees has been charged with terrorism.
Justice Department spokesperson Barbara Comstock responded to the report
by saying, "We make no apologies." Adem Carroll of the Islamic
Circle of North America suggested that the report be "mined for lawsuits,
for trying to reform the process and ultimately for holding Attorney General
John Ashcroft responsible."
ANYBODY'S WORST NIGHTMARE
Ali Raza was among the numerous Pakistanis caught in the dragnet. In
1995 his parents pooled their savings and sent him to the U.S. to escape
persecution. Then, in October 2001, an anonymous tip brought INS and FBI
agents to a friend's apartment. Raza was roasting chicken when he was
arrested for not producing valid immigration documents.
"It was anybody's worst nightmare," Raza recalls, "the
Feds busting down your door, taking you away."
The agents carted him off to Passaic County Jail, one of two facilities
investigated by the OIG, where he spent six months. Raza charges that
the report consistently understates the abuse suffered by jailed detainees.
The OIG report has not shaken Attorney General John Ashcroft's drive
"to seek every prosecutorial advantage" and "use all weapons"
in the "war against terrorism."
The same week the damning report was released, he shamelessly called
upon the House Judiciary Committee to give him more power to investigate,
arrest and imprison. As the president launches preemptive strikes in the
war abroad, the attorney general promotes preventive detentions at home
in an escalating war on immigrants.
The courts are bowing to Ashcroft's will. A Washington, D.C. appeals
court, reversing a lower court decision, ruled that the government may
conceal the names of more than 700 people locked up after Sept. 11 because
making their identities public "would give terrorist organizations
a composite picture of the government investigation."
In April the Supreme Court ruled in Demore v. Kim that the government
can jail entire classes of immigrants during deportation proceedings,
even if a judge has determined that they are neither a flight risk nor
a threat to society. The only other time in U.S. history that the Justices
upheld blanket detention without individualized review was the Japanese
American internment during World War II.
ILLEGAL RACIAL PROFILING
The OIG report, expected since October 2002, contained numerous compromises
and omissions. It was careful to not accuse the Justice Department of
racism, even though the report documents the targeting and intense intimidation
suffered by South Asian, Arab, and Muslim men.
Nor does the report address whether the numerous abuses of the Justice
Department and the FBI violated the law. Neither criminal nor civil charges
have been brought against any government entity or employee for abusing
detainees.
Raza skeptically remarked, "This report is just a formality, to
shut up organizations and journalists. All the government has to say is
'national security' and they can do it again."
Some of the OIG recommendations, such as greater information sharing
among law enforcement, may worsen the racial profiling suffered by immigrants
and citizens alike.
Subhash Kateel, an organizer with the anti-detention group Families for
Freedom, cautiously celebrates the OIG report for "vindicating immigrants
jailed after Sept. 11. But the victory must not stay symbolic. Rallies,
hunger strikes and public outcry forced the authorities to confess that
they abused their powers. This abuse is not a beast of the past. Immigrants
from all backgrounds suffer the government's beatings, intimidation and
round ups today."
Aarti Shahani is a fellow at the National Immigration Project
of the National Lawyers Guild.
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