No. of Recommendations: 8
Astounding story, a 60 yr old tourist with a valid tourist Visa, imprisoned for 6 weeks!
I gotta think there's a way she could sue the US for wrongful imprisonment.
Almost certainly not. Because of this detail, which is mentioned briefly in the article, but is almost certainly the most important fact.
“He said, ‘If you volunteer for self-removal – and because of the special relationship the US has with the UK – it will be over very quickly,’” Karen continues. They’d have to sign a document that would mean they would be banned from the US for up to 10 years, and waive their right to go before a judge. If they chose not to, and waited for their day in court, they would be prolonging the ordeal, she was told.
“I said to him, ‘I’m on holiday. I want to go home.’ I would have taken the shortest route, whatever it was, which he said was volunteering for self-removal.” So they signed. Karen had no way of knowing that she was only on day three of what would turn out to be 42 days of detention.
Now, we have no way of knowing the specifics of what was in the document she signed. But it's almost certainly terrible for her. I'm sure it's filled with admissions and waivers - admissions that she was present in the country illegally, that she had knowingly committed violations of U.S. immigration law, admissions that she had assisted others in violating immigration law, waiver of rights to contest her detention or removal, etc. Again, we don't know the details, but there's probably no way the government would lose a case once she's signed that document. She probably signed all her rights away.
Plus, from the article, it appears that almost the entire time she was in detention was during the government shutdown, when many (most?) non-essential government operations were on hold. The article dismisses this desultorily by saying that Karen saw people being deported from the facility during that time...but processing a "voluntary self-removal" may have been in a different part of ICE functioning than "ordinary" deportations. The latter are an exercise of a law enforcement function, while the former isn't necessarily in the same basket (again, because the government isn't technically forcing them out, but rather helping them leave voluntarily so they can avoid the formal deportation process). Who knows whether that was technically true or not, but it's unlikely the government's going to incur liability if it chose to prioritize resources during a shutdown to the pure deportations rather than the voluntary self-removal basket.
Tying this into the thread topic - this isn't legal advice, but if you do get detained you probably don't want to do what she did. You likely don't want to say anything, and certainly not SIGN anything, before talking to a lawyer. The LEO's are not on your side, they don't have to tell you the truth, and they can't commit to something being faster or easier or better for you if you just give up your rights.
