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Immigration Law

: Greg Siskind's Blog

ICE TO CUT BACK ON FORCED SEDATING OF DEPORTEES

By Greg Siskind

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Over the past couple of years on this blog, I've reported on a number of disturbing examples of cruel and offensive treatment of those in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. It's nice to be able to report on good news. According to a report in the Dallas Morning News, ICE has dramatically reduced the number of cases where the anti-psychotic drugs such as Haldol are used to forcibly sedate people being deported.

ICE was under considerable pressure to reduce or eliminate the practice as a result of law suits and public pressure. The News reports that ICE has instituted a new policy to require a court order and the recommendation of medical personnel before administering the sedating drugs. The new policy has had a dramatic effect:

Data collected through Freedom of Information Act requests by The Dallas Morning News show that Immigration and Customs Enforcement sedated only 10 people in the past fiscal year. Haldol was used in only three cases.
Over the past six years, through October, federal immigration personnel sedated 384 deportees, an average of 64 a year, the government disclosed. Of those cases, 356 involved the use of Haldol.

Here's a little information on Haldol:

Haldol is used to treat schizophrenia and such psychotic symptoms as hallucinations, delusions and hostility.
It is sometimes used in hospital emergency rooms to manage acute agitation and psychosis.
Medical authorities say the use of Haldol carries potential complications. The drug can trigger such adverse reactions as muscular spasms and a condition known as neuroleptic malignant syndrome that can result in a coma and even death if left untreated.
Scott Allen, an internist and co-founder of the Center for Prisoner Health and Human Rights in Providence, R.I., said he opposes sedation except for deportees with schizophrenia or other mental illness.

In the past year, ICE has managed to significantly increase deportations and it has achieved this objective without resorting to doping deportees. Defenders of the practice of using the anti-psychotic drugs argued that ICE agents could not do their jobs without the drugs. The evidence now clearly shows otherwise.

Full post as published by Greg Siskind's Blog on December 29, 2008 (boomark / email).

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