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Our favorite link-back today is from Latina Lista. Go there, hang out, add your comment. Say the Texas Civil Rights Review sent you.

Latina Lista on Hutto Jail Hats off to bloggers who manage comments. Spammers ran me out of that business.

Here’s a clip from Latina Lista correspondent Aztec:

As one reader tells Latina Lista today:

After reading your blog on the facility that holds families accused of being illegal under those terrible conditions, I decided to call Homeland Security to express my outrage through their “Citizen’s comment line.” What happened next is laughable though expected. I was transferred by the operator at Homeland Security to the comment line and received this automated message:

“I’m sorry, you cannot leave a message because the box is full.”

When I got the operator back, I was transferred several times to be told by one person: “Call back in a few minutes, an office assistant is ‘cleaning it out.’”

I replied, “What does that mean? Are you guys just deleting the comments to make more room!?”

Whereupon she hesitantly replied, “No, but we’re deleting the ones…well, you know….”

I said, “I do? So am I to understand that an office aide is assigned the task of deeming messages ” insignificant” versus “worthy? By the way, exactly who in the office listens to the screened messages?” ”

She replied, “Um, I’m not sure…”

It sounded by the tone of her voice, that the messages left are given little weight, if at all. Perhaps you should find out the answers to the questions I listed above before people try to call only to end up with their messages getting deleted for their trouble. I’m sure that would make interesting fodder for a blog.

good luck.
Aztec

Luissana Santibanez speaks to demonstrators at Hutto Detention center, Taylor (Dec. 16, 2006 – photo by Susan Van Haitsma)

Jay Johnson-Castro (left) among children at Hutto Detention center vigil, Taylor (Dec. 16, 2006 – photo by Susan Van Haitsma)

We have been able to locate only one news report on the vigil (although the Statesman and BBC Mundo did advance pieces). Here is the link to News 8 Austin, the 24-hour news channel for Time-Warner Cable.

Group protests children being held in Hutto prison.

12/17/2006 4:20 PM

By: News 8 Austin Staff

The treatment of immigrants brought out protestors in Taylor. Dozens gathered outside the T. Don Hutto prison Saturday.

They say the prison houses immigrants who are awaiting asylum or deportation hearings.

Of the 400 immigrants housed there, the protestors say half are children.

“Think about your infant, your little toddler your little child in jail. Think about the innocent child having to wake up every day in a jail cell,” said Frances Valdez of the University of Texas Immigration Clinic

The facility holds people anywhere from several weeks to several months.

Protestors believe the incarceration of children is inhumane and that there are better alternatives for dealing with immigrants.

“This is a travesty – this is an outrage, it’s shocking. It’s anti-American it’s anti-freedom,” said Jay Johnson-Castro, a Grassroots supporter.

Rebecca Bernhardt from the A.C.L.U. of TEXAS says, “We also need to talk about why this is an incredible waste of taxpayer resources and that they know they have alternatives to this jail”.

Adults and children took part in the protest. They held signs and banners calling for justice.

Email from Jay Johnson-Castro (Dec. 23)

Mornin’ amigos…

Christmas Eve Vigil for the children imprisoned with their mothers at the Hutto prison camp in Taylor , Texas .

Time: Just one hour…between 5pm-6pm. Music and candles.

Location: 1400 Welch St. , Taylor , TX .

Regarding this vigil, I received this caution from someone who knows more about the inside of the Hutto prison camp than most of us.

I would be careful though, because I heard that as a result of the last vigil, the detainees were kind of in lock-down most of the day. They didn’t get to go outside that day. So I would be careful, because you wouldn’t want ICE to get upset and take it out on the detainees. Just a heads-up.

I feel the tearing expressed above. For me…it is very simple. It’s a must to go. We want the children and their moms to know that someone in America cares.

What do we have to do? Wait for them to start tattooing numbers on their wrists? This has to be exposed. We will shame these entities. We will free these people. Freedom doesn’t come easy…or cheap.

Chertoff & Company rule by fear. Yet…if YOU were inside…which would YOU rather experience? A lock down because Americans were outside protesting your conditions? Or spend Christmas with your kids for 22 hours on Christmas day…in your cell anyway…knowing that NO ONE was out there?

While attorneys cannot inspect the inside of this facility…nor can the media…did you know who can. Any significant investor in privatized prisons can tour the facilities. As a country, are we now moving from a military-industrial complex to an ICE/immigration-privatization complex? Who really rules America when these conditions are secret from the public and the media…but open to those with the capitol? Chertoff & Company…and their financial backers?

Did you know that ICE has offices in Hutto…with some 50 ICE personnel…or so an official told Fox News on video.

Did you know that the helpless in the prison camps have no way of communicating with the outside…unless the buy the CCA phone cards? $20 for 20 minutes. Can someone explain to me how a terrorized mother and her children who have been striped of all human dignity and has no money gets justice in our country?

That’s my take on this issue…and that of Teye and Belen. We want the moms and kids to know that we are there. That some one cares. That we care. And Chertoff & Company need to know too! Some folks will be attending. Some media too. The message is spilling all over the world. Just Google “hutto detention families children”. In just one week, the message is now global.

Our presence will bring hope…something that fascism does not want these people to experience or enjoy. Some individuals and media have indicated that they’ll be there. Where we are few or not…makes no difference. The moms and especially the children will know the “We the people of the United States of America” have not forgotten them…and will not forget them. We demand their freedom.

What is almost as good is that Chertoff & Company will know too! It is our belief that what is being committed here behind the razor wires of the Hutto prison camp is not only immoral but criminal. We are demanding democracy and due process. A congressional investigation…and a UN investigation. This is beyond war crimes. This is a crime on humanity…to imprison mothers and children who come to this country seeking asylum.

Over this issue… America has a chance to wake up! Really wake up!!!

Silent night. Holy night. All is calm. All is bright. Tomorrow night!!!

Jay

Email from Jay Johnson-Castro

Hola y’all…

Following is a real heads up. The ICE/Hutto partnership might be even worse than we thought just a couple of days ago.

First I’d like to say that I am very grateful to the media for covering the imprisonment of the 200 children in Taylor , Tx . In particular, I’m grateful to Steve Taylor of http://www.riograndeguardian.com for breaking the story. I’m grateful to Diego Muñoz, the anchor of Univision/Austin, for following the walk so closely. I’m grateful to Javier Aparisi of BBC for making this international…and to Juan Castillo of the Austin Stateman for a great front page story.

Juan’s story in the Stateman was very comprehensive and fair. It did trigger the following letter that was written to him by an immigration attorney, John Gibson, who justifiable vents his outrage, not at the Statesman, but at the tyrannical administration that would treat humans in America like the current administration under Bush and Chertoff. You’ll see below that John Gibson has clients in Hutto that are LEGAL!!!

[The Gibson letter has been posted as a separate story–gm] It’s not Juan’s or the Stateman’s fault that such tyrannical conditions exist in Hutto. Juan did the truth a great service by bringing this subject to the readership of the Statesman. It’s the fault of the current administration and especially Chertoff…whose idea is to have even more facilities that imprison children in dog pound like conditions. At the same time, John Gibson’s outrage below really exposes an evil in this country even worse than folks like me even thought it was just a few days ago.

I appeal to all immigration attorneys who know this stuff is going on…as well as to the different organizations that give a crap…to pool the knowledge and information you have. Let get all the transparency out to the public that we can. Cock roaches cannot stand the light!

If Hutto…as a half year old experiment…is the best product of the current Chertoff tyranny…what exists below this level folks? What preceded it? What is happening in secret all over this state and all over this country…for profit?

We must not allow this to get back below the radar of the media and the public. Please help keep the light on the subject. Get access into these so called “detention centers” which are little more than prison camps that exploit desperate people only to make obscene profits.

Like John Gibson, caring attorneys need to provide the facts to the media. Organizations like LULAC and the ACLU will hopefully take legal and political action. The US Congress should demand an investigation of this situation. Even the UN should investigate this. How about Amnest International?

Human rights and dignity must be demanded for these children…and any refugee…in order to regain and preserve a free and open society. Occult and Gulag tactics must not continue to exist in America . This wharped and demented mentality must be brought to an abrumpt end!!!

Ultimately…it is “We the people” that must do something. It may be that we will have to keep walking to Hutto…and to any other facility…and keep on holding vigils…until this violation of human rights is extinguished.

Any thoughts will be appreciated…

Jay

P.S. Some media links to the plight at the Hutto facility…

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/12/15/15immigprison.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/spanish/international/newsid_6184000/6184849.stm

https://texascivilrightsreview.org/phpnuke/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=686

http://www.myfoxaustin.com/myfox/pages/News
/Detail?contentId=1776864&version=1&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=VSTY&pageId=3.2.1

http://www.kut.org/items/show/6811

http://www.news8austin.com/content/top_stories/?ArID=176608

http://eyeonwilliamson.org/?p=716

http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/2006/12/family-thats-jailed-together.html.

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Connecting the dots…making a difference…

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Jay J. Johnson-Castro, Sr.

jay@villadelrio.com