Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Life at Ritmo: Let them eat maggots

Even those who support mass deportation of illegal immigrants surely cannot countenance the treatment of those imprisoned in Willacy County's increasingly notorious "Ritmo" facility. According to KGBT-TV ("Detention center food problems," Aug. 6):
security guards have recorded in their logbooks dozens of undocumented immigrants that have found maggots in their food.

The federal detention center located in Raymondville which houses two-thousand undocumented immigrants has received criticism for allegedly feeding detainees contaminated or rotten food.

An action 4 News investigation reveals that in one instance, over 30 detainees reported that the quantity and quality of food are deplorable, an allegation confirmed by at least two security guards.

One of those anonymous guards says: "the reason it gets contaminated it's because of the storage facility, they don't have the storage facility. They were trying to blame the companies that supposedly the food is coming in spoiled which is not true."

Detainees say they don't have toiletries to keep their most basic sanitary needs, that they have problems communicating with the outside world, nevertheless finding an attorney or any kind of legal assistance.
I hardly know how to react to this disgraceful news. I treat my dogs better than that.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Treating dogs... you just hit the key. The very first child protective laws grew out of the MSPCA! Old Salty

Anonymous said...

What the article failed to mention was that this facility is operated and managed by Management and Training Corporation, a privately held private prison company out of Utah.

Anonymous said...

I find it interesting that people (myself included) can wax eloquently about the injustices in TYC, yet we ignore this piece about Ritmo. How can we be so callous about our fellow human beings! God forgive us, please! Old Salty

Anonymous said...

Yes. I'm on the inside also and, you do have higher Rank Lt.at pm shift miss treating the detainees at un-respectful manner,and when you do bring it to the attention,of higher yet presonnal you get, a very disagreeable attude twords self...