Every county in Virginia has ended its 287g agreement with ICE except Culpeper. So how are so many Virginians still ending up at ICA-Farmville and Caroline Detention Facility? Most through ICE’s Criminal Alien Program with law enforcement agencies (thread)

Law enforcement agencies VOLUNTARILY participate in the CAP. Meaning local, state, and federal correctional facilities have the option of whether or not to file an ICE detainer when they have someone without citizenship in their custody who is elegible for release.

Regardless of the fact that they already served their time or had their charges dropped, the CAP ensures that the day people without US citizenship are released from jail or prison, that they will have ICE waiting for them outside to transfer them to the next prison.

Except these prisons, or “immigrant detention centers,” are exclusively designed for people without US citizenship. “Detainees” (not inmates) do not serve any sentence. They are there awaiting their deportation or attempting the years-long process of appealing their removal order

In 2021, we need Virginians holding politicians and law enforcement agencies accountable for collaborating with ICE. Deportation can often times be a death sentence for those who came to the US fleeing persecution.

The CAP sends people, who would otherwise be enjoying their first days of freedom, on a fast-track path to deportation, permanently separating families, as it is a federal crime to re-enter the US for TEN YEARS after being deported.

Virginia families are suffering from law enforcement agencies’ participation in the Criminal Alien Program. How many people have we heard from at @Resistencia_VA with loved ones in VA ICE camps who were handed over to ICE after being released from Fairfax or PWC custody? Too many

During the pandemic alone, James Hill and Cipriano Chávez-Álvarez were both released from prison due to being high-risk for COVID. Both were handed straight over to ICE upon release and died in ICE custody after contracting the virus. Both had families waiting for them. https://twitter.com/detentionwatch/status/1323292111043731457