New Lawsuit in Canada Challenges the Use of Maximum-Security Jails for Immigrant Detention

Today’s Toronto Star reports on a new lawsuit in Canada challenging the use of maximum-security jails for the purpose of immigration detention.

Although immigrants are held in these jails, they are not charged with a crime and civil detention is not supposed to be punitive. As Toronto Star reporter Brendan Kennedy quotes the lawyer for the detainees as saying: “No one who is not convicted of a crime or is not accused of a crime should be placed there.”

Those interested in learning more about the jailing of immigrant detainees in Canada should definitely read this article by Stephanie J. Silverman and Petra Molnar: Everyday Injustices, published in the Refugee Survey Quarterly (March 2016), pp. 109-127.

IE