Aditi Shah, a 2021-2022 Borchard Fellow in Law and Aging hosted by the ACLU National Prison Project, has written another blog post on access to legal counsel issues faced by ICE detainees. In her posting, she addresses the impact of denial of counsel on older adults in immigration detention. She notes:
The barriers to access to counsel in ICE detention facilities disproportionately affect vulnerable groups. Older adults (age 55+) in immigration detention are especially vulnerable to abuse and are more likely to have serious medical needs, and as a result, would especially benefit from legal advocacy. For example, in the past two years since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, older adults in immigration detention have been among the most likely individuals for whom immigration detention was especially dangerous, and potentially a death sentence. Nineteen of the 41 people (approximately 46 percent) who have died in ICE custody since fiscal year 2018 were over the age of 50, a stark reminder of the vulnerability of older adults in detention.
