Immigrants were exposed to hazardous chemicals in detention centers

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A new lawsuit filed against one of the nation’s largest for-profit prison operators, GEO Group Inc., alleges the company improperly used toxic chemicals to clean its detention centers, causing inmates to get sick.

The Social Justice Legal Foundation is representing seven currently and formerly incarcerated individuals of the immigration detention facility in Adelanto, Calif. Attorneys for the company claim that while Adelanto had used the chemical, HDQ Neutral, for at least 10 years, staff at the facility increased the spraying of the product at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S.

The attorneys for SJLF allege that due to the detainees’ months-long, near-constant exposure to this chemical from February 2020 to April 2021, they suffered symptoms like persistent cough, throat and nasal irritation, skin irritation, rashes and headaches.
Plaintiffs say they found blood in their mouths and saliva, suffered from debilitating headaches, felt dizzy and lightheaded, and now deal with long-term chronic health issues as a result of their exposure to the chemical.

A spokesman for GEO Group Inc. said the company strongly rejects the allegations “that GEO uses any harmful chemicals as cleaning products in our ICE Processing Centers.”

The spokesman said, “In all our ICE Processing Centers, GEO uses cleaning products that are regulated by the EPA and are always used in accordance with the manufacturer’s guidelines, as well as all applicable sanitation standards set by federal government’s Performance-Based National Detention Standards .”

But in 2021, the EPA issued a warning against GEO Group for the “use of a registered pesticide in a manner inconsistent with its labeling” after an inspection spurred by detainees’ complaints about illness after exposure to HDQ Neutral.

What’s allegedly happening in Adelanto is part of a pattern of conduct by GEO, Social Justice Legal Foundation Executive Director Shubhra Shivpuri told NPR.

GEO Group Inc. has faced several lawsuits by inmates and families of prisoners over the years due to alleged conditions at its prisons and immigration detention facilities. The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is GEO’s biggest source of customer revenue streams.

GEO Group Inc.’s Adelanto facility has also been subject to scathing criticism by federal government watchdogs. Reports have emerged that detainees’ health and safety were at risk while at Adelanto and that solitary confinement was used for long periods of time in violation of ICE’s own standards, among other problems. Despite these prior problems, ICE renewed and expanded a contract to keep the Adelanto facility open.

GEO Group’s spokesman said allegations such as the ones presented by SJLF are part of “a long-standing, politically motivated, and radical campaign to attack ICE’s contractors, abolish ICE, and end federal immigration detention by proxy.”