From Persecution to Prison - Bellevue/NYU Program for Survivors of ...

Whenever someone misbehaves, they take you to ‘the hole.’ That makesme afraid. I hear the hole is a horrible place.Several detained asylum seekers noted how the apparently arbitraryimposition of segregation resulted in a sense of general insecurity and anxiety.For example, one detainee noted:If you argue with a guard, or you ask them a question, they will startwatching you. And any slight mistake after that – they will move you tothe hole. I think once they start watching you, they look for a reason toput you in the hole… One time, they called us for lunch. They wouldsometimes give us seconds. But then they stopped giving us seconds. Weasked them why and they took away our TV for two weeks. The officersaid, ‘If you continue to ask for seconds, you will go to the hole.’Another detainee at the same facility commented,Once when we were watching TV – it was at a time when we wereallowed to – the officer came and shut the TV off. He said it was tooloud. When we complained, he said he would put us in ‘the hole.’Reported another individual:If they ask you to do something and you refuse they will take you to segregation.For example, last week, we were walking down the hallwayfor religious service, my friend and myself we all were talking. So one ofthe officers said ‘If you don’t shut up we will take you to segregation.’They threaten you with segregation for anything. For example if theycome into the dorm and you haven’t made your bed, they’ll threaten youwith segregation.One subject reported that a guard “threatened me because I was talkingto a depressed friend after ‘Lights Out’.”While many detainees felt that segregation was an inappropriateresponse to acknowledged incidents, others insisted that the guards’ motivationfor punishing them or others with segregation was often a completemystery. For example, one asylum seeker said,I don’t know why I was put in segregation. They said, ‘Stand up,’ andthey put me in handcuffs and put me in segregation for the night. Thenext day I had court. I couldn’t sleep all night. Not only me, but six guysfrom my dorm, too. Three days ago, a guy changed the channel and theyput him in segregation.”In a county jail, another asylum seeker witnessed a disturbing incident:Once when I was relaxing in the room with other asylum seekers, severalguards rushed in and dragged two people out and yelled ‘Turnaway, don’t look’ and took two people to segregation. I think they did116 FROM PERSECUTION TO PRISON