FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

OIG Report Confirms Whistleblower Claims of Wrongdoing at Irwin County Detention Center

WASHINGTON- Yesterday the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) released its final report, “Medical Processes and Communication Protocols Need Improvement at Irwin County Detention Center” outlining Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) grave shortcomings in medical healthcare at the Irwin County Detention Center (ICDC), an ICE facility owned and operated by LaSalle Corrections, a private prison company. The findings validate disclosures made to the OIG and Congress in September 2020 by Government Accountability Project’s client, ICDC nurse Dawn Wooten, as well as ICE detainees, regarding failures to protect workers and immigrants from COVID-19 and inadequate medical care at the rural Georgia facility. While Ms. Wooten’s disclosures, and in part, the OIG’s report, reveal a toxic and dangerous culture within one ICE detention facility, the findings are symptomatic of an immigration detention system at large that has consistently proven unable to protect both workers and immigrants.

Ms. Wooten’s whistleblower disclosures, which also included high rates of unnecessary, nonconsensual gynecological procedures performed on women in detention, went viral in September 2020, prompting Congressional investigations and resolutions, a class action lawsuit on behalf of survivors, and international public outcry. Ultimately, DHS...

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