As reported COVID-19 cases in Pennsylvania continue to grow, the Shut Down Berks Coalition urgently demands that Governor Wolf immediately issue an Emergency Removal Order (ERO) to stop ICE from using the Berks County Detention Center as a family prison. Calls needed:
- Governor Tom Wolf: 717-787-2500, @GovernorTomWolf
- Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman: 717-787-3300, @JohnFetterman
- DHS Secretary Teresa Miller: 717-787-2600, @SecretaryMiller
Public health experts have advised against large gatherings of people, and the Governor has rightly taken action to shut down the capitol and schools across the Commonwealth. We ask that he extend the same protections to all those currently incarcerated, in civil and immigrant detention alike.
Jails, prisons and detention centers are cramped and unsanitary places where people are routinely denied healthcare. The Berks County Detention Center already has a long history of medical neglect and medical outbreaks, in addition to detention itself being physically and mentally harmful. COVID-19 creates conditions that will inevitably result in a human rights crisis in Berks and other Pennsylvania prisons unless the Commonwealth takes decisive action.
COVID-19 has already arrived at a private prison in Delaware County, the infection brought in by a staff member. There is every likelihood the same will happen in Berks.
The Shut Down Berks Coalition demands that Governor Tom Wolf to act swiftly in issuing an ERO and work with Berks County Commissioners Barnhardt, Leinbach and Rivera to transition the family prison into a facility that provides human services for the people of Berks County. Further inaction by the Governor and Commissioners during this pandemic is risking the lives of both the families and detention center workers.
Concurrently, Federal immigrant officials in 2019 made it national policy to deny those in their custody vaccinations for influenza. The imprisoned cannot practice social distancing to protect themselves from the Coronavirus. Detained families with no access to proper hygiene and real medical care combined with overcrowding, institutionalized medical neglect, and now the threat of Coronavirus, will only ensure that people will die. Lack of medical care and poor detention conditions have already caused 37 reported deaths since Trump has been in office, and eight deaths in 2020 alone, many of whom have been children.
That is why Governor Wolf must issue an Emergency Removal Order immediately. No person should die as a result of the unlawful practice of family detention.
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