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Detention of refugee women and children over the last thirteen or fourteen months at Artesia, Berks, Karnes, and Dilley was immoral, unconstitutional, a violation of international law, contrary to the…

Lilian Oliva Bardales, 19, was deported to Honduras six days after she shut herself in a bathroom of a Texas family detention center and cut her wrist. In her last week at the Karnes County Residential Center, she said she was taken from her young son, stripped naked in front of screaming staffers, put into isolation and then, back with her son, hidden at a hotel before being removed from the country.

"Johnson, a former consultant to immigration attorneys negotiating with government officials on behalf of the detained mothers and children, was terminated from the role shortly after he leaked to McClatchy a copy of the court’s confidential draft ruling, which concluded that the Obama’s administration’s rapid increase of family detention centers violates parts of a 1997 settlement on migrant children."

In a press released dated Wednesday, June 24, DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson announced a few changes to ICE's policy on family detention. While stating that long-term detention practices will be ceased, family detention will continue along with the human rights abuses that remain a hallmark of corporate for-profit prison systems. For families affected by long-term detention, ransom (bond) will still be required in exchange for certain liberties.

This cell phone video footage was released this week and reveals a protest with numerous imprisoned families chanting "libertad" during a Congressional tour this past Monday, June 22, 2015.

"In this response to our request to shut down the South Texas Family Residential Center (STFRC), Commissioner of Texas' Department of Family and Protective Services responded that his agency has no authority to protect children detained there."

ICE's new guidelines are the latest phase in their public relations campaign to deceive the public about the harsh realities of incarcerating women and children who should never have been detained in the first place.

On Monday, May 11, 2015, activists and family members of detained women and children met with the office of President Obama to deliver a letter urging him to free families from…

"We ask that you free us and grant us refuge. Please give us a chance to demonstrate to you that we are honest, responsible, and hardworking mothers. We want our children in the future to be men and women who benefit society, but we need your help."

Featured image by Melissa Biggs [View the story "#EndFamilyDetention Protest in Dilley TX" on Storify]

A lawsuit has been filed on behalf of the mothers and children imprisoned at the Karnes detention camp. "Attached is a copy of a retaliation complaint filed this afternoon.  The…

This second phase of protest by a group of 15 -20 mothers comes on the heels of a Holy Week hunger strike in which they released a document signed by 74 women demanding their freedom and rebutting the argument being made by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that they and their children are a threat to national security of the United States.

During a Congressional hearing Congressman Hank Jonhnson questioned ICE Director Sarah Saldana on why Delmy was put in isolation with her 11 year old son.

Public information request - Indigenous Women, Children, and "Family Units" in Custody at the Karnes County Residential Center (hereafter "Karnes"), the South Texas Family Residential Center (hereafter "Dilley"), and the…