Phoenix, AZ – In response to the U.S. Department of Justice filing a lawsuit against Southwest Key Programs alleging that the organization failed to protect unaccompanied immigrant children in its facilities from sexual abuse, the Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project (Florence Project) issued the following statement:
“The Florence Project has unfortunately seen a pattern of abuse, mistreatment, and lack of accountability for years at child detention facilities. Massive congregate care facilities are ill-equipped to ensure the safety of these unaccompanied migrant children, and a lack of effective oversight by state and federal authorities compounds the problem.
Sadly, the stories in the complaint are not a surprise to us. The Florence Project has seen so many instances of abuse and mistreatment at migrant shelter facilities that we have developed a roadmap for dealing with these cases, and we have represented several child survivors of institutional abuse.
Every instance of institutional abuse is heart wrenching, and we are pleased to see the government seek some accountability with this lawsuit. However, we must get to a point where we prevent abuse like this from occurring in the first place. We must never forget we are talking about children, who have needs and dreams and deserve to be treated like any other child in the United States.
This lawsuit comes on the heels of a recent court decision largely terminating the Flores Settlement, a critical backstop of protections for detained children. While new regulations governing the care of unaccompanied minors in government custody implement many critical aspects of the Flores Settlement protections, they are still sadly lacking in important oversight, transparency, and licensing requirements. This means that under the new rules, when it comes to oversight and licensing in these shelters, there will be even less oversight for children in detention now than when the incidents in this complaint happened.
Congress must act now to protect the rights and dignity of immigrant children by codifying and funding oversight mechanisms and implementing licensing requirements for shelters, which are necessary to ensure children’s safety and well-being.”