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You hear a lot of people talking about the fox guarding the hen-house. Putting the Fed in charge of the Wall St. bailout certainly comes to mind. But for an even more striking example, ask yourself this question: how do we know that the private guards supervising illegal aliens at private immigration lockups aren’t illegal immigrants themselves? According to Gene Johnson’s article for the Associated Press, the answer is simple: we just don’t know.
A privately run immigration lockup in Tacoma hired nearly 100 security guards without background checks, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) didn’t catch the practice for two years, court documents show. Hiring and oversight at privately run lockups has been a crisis for years, but the Tacoma situation is a stunner.
Sylvia Wong, an administrator in charge of hiring at the Northwest Detention Center, pleaded guilty in federal court in Tacoma to one count of making a false statement for lying to investigators. In her plea deal with prosecutors, Wong admitted that soon after starting work in November 2005 she began hiring guards without background checks “because of the pressure she felt to get security personnel hired at the NWDC as quickly as possible,” according to court records.
ICE auditors discovered that 92 guards had been hired without checks. The agency acknowledges that some of the guards have been fired after subsequent background exams. But like the exact number of air marshals, and what happened to the $15 billion DHS has shelled out in failed contracts, federal officials won’t say how many of the guards have been canned or arrested.
“In response to this investigation, we have implemented a multi-thread vetting process . . . so that no contractor or federal employee has sole responsibility to process and approve employment documents,” ICE spokeswoman Lorie Dankers said in a statement.
“We have taken proactive steps to prevent this from happening again.” The Northwest Detention Center opened in 2004 and holds about 1,000 people accused of immigration violations, mainly detainees from Alaska, Oregon and Washington. It’s run by the Florida-based GEO Group Inc., with yearly reviews to “ensure the facility meets ICE standards.”
When guards are hired at the detention center, they are supposed to undergo a preliminary background check. If they pass, they are given “entry on duty” forms allowing them to begin work pending a more thorough check, which can take several months to more than a year.
The plea agreement said that when Wong hired the guards, she fabricated “entry on duty” forms, allowing them to start work without any background check. Add this page to your favorite Social Bookmarking websites        
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