MEMPHIS, TN. April 16, 2018 — Memphis police and sheriff’s departments targeted journalist Manuel Duran in retaliation for his critical reporting on how those agencies cooperate with ICE, Southern Poverty Law Center attorney Michelle Lapointe told the Memphis media today.
The SPLC on Friday filed a writ of habeas corpus petition in a Louisiana federal court seeking Duran’s immediate release, having earlier filed a motion in Atlanta immigration court to open his case. Attorneys on Friday achieved a temporary stay of his deportation until further action by the Atlanta court. Duran fled El Salvador amid threats on his life, but he never received notice of any deportation actions in 2007, the lawsuit contends.
“Manuel Duran is a well-known journalist and Memphis community member,” Lapointe said. “Manuel’s journalism is often critical of immigration and customs enforcement -- and the police. He has challenged local law enforcement’s denial that they collaborate with ICE. He has covered how immigration enforcement tears apart families and communities.”
RETALIATION
“Because of his work to hold our government accountable, Manuel has been targeted. To be clear, Manuel Duran was retaliated against by local law enforcement and the federal government simply for doing his job as a journalist.
“On April 3 he was arrested unlawfully here in Memphis, and he is now being unconstitutionally detained by the Department of Homeland Security in Louisiana,” Lapointe said. “After nearly a decade of living in Memphis, Manuel Duran is enduring prison-like conditions. We are fighting back.”
SPLC’s lawsuit, filed in U.S. Western District Court in Alexandria, LA, seeks Duran’s immediate release and claims violation of his First (speech and press), Fourth (privacy and person), Fifth (due process) and Fourteenth (unlawful detention) rights.
FIRST AMENDMENT
“Manuel’s First Amendment rights to free speech and freedom of press were violated when law enforcement targeted and arrested him in retaliation for his reporting.
“His arrest while covering the April 3 protests was without a warrant or probable cause and blatantly violated his Fourth Amendment rights. All charges were dropped. Holding a person without a lawful basis violates the U.S. Constitution and its guarantee of due process.
“Manuel’s unlawful arrest and his unconstitutional detention not only harms him and his family,’ Lapointe said. “Government actions like this make our community less safe by driving a wedge between law enforcement and the communities they are supposed to protect.
CHILLING PRESS FREEDOM
“These actions also have a chilling effect on press freedom by sending a message that journalists who challenge the government will be targeted and retaliated against. This is not what our country is supposed to stand for.
“Today we stand together seeking justice for Manuel Duran. We stand together seeking justice for the countless people, including the men, women and children impacted by the raid in East Tennessee by immigration, and all of those who suffer from President Trump’s extreme anti-immigrant agenda -- and all of those who are stuck in the inhumane deportation dragnet.
“Immigrants are members of our families; they strengthen our communities and our nation. Immigrants contribute to our economy. Like all of us, immigrants deserve to be treated with fairness and dignity.
“Manuel Duran deserves to be treated with fairness and dignity,” Lapointe said. “We ask the Department of Homeland Security to release Manuel Duran.”
Southern Poverty Law Center release:
www.splcenter.org/...
Petition Writ of Habeas Corpus: https://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/manuel_duran_habeas_final.pdf
POLICE RESPOND
Memphis director of police services Michael Rallings gathered reporters on Tuesday April 17 to deny SPLC’s assertion.
“The question that we targeted Mr. Duran is just false,” Rallings said. “Frankly, I’m upset about it, because we don’t want poor relations with the Latino community. We are here to support all of our brothers and sisters in Memphis, Tennessee, regardless of your status -- and I’ve been very clear on that -- regardless of your color, your religion or your gender.”
Rallings showed reporters a photo of Duran meeting with him in an MPD conference room.
“We don’t enforce the immigration laws. We don’t question the status of any individuals,” Rallings said.
In the state legislature, however, two bills would require local law enforcement agencies to cooperate with federal officials to enforce immigration laws. HB2315 and SB2332 further would prohibit cities from adopting “sanctuary policies,” upon the threat of losing state funding.
LETTER FROM ICE JAIL
Duran’s partner of seven years, Melisa Valdez, read Duran’s statement from the LaSalle Detention Center in Jena, LA, in which he cited stories about unjust treatment of other detainees he has met. Below is the entirely of Duran’s letter.
“I cannot thank you enough for the support I have received since the moment of my arrest and subsequent transfer and incarceration in Louisiana. This episode in my life has not been easy, but I have taken it as an opportunity to learn first hand the drama and reality that our families are living when they are arrested by immigration and then deported.
“Families like Jorge’s, who is in detention with me. He has been in jail for three months; he has three very young children, ages 4, 5, and 10. One of them has a heart problem. But Jorge will be deported as soon as his trip is allowed by his country’s consulate. He could not fight his case because he could not afford an immigration attorney.
“Or Fernando’s, who is 64 years old and has three U.S. citizen children, but has been in detention for the past seven months and is now about to be deported back to hiscountry, away from his family and everything he knows, after his attorney couldn’t win his case.
“Once you’re inside the detention facility it is extremely hard to get the phone number of a private attorney, and if you are lucky enough to find one, the attorney costs thousands of dollars.
A CRUEL SYSTEM
“No one should be deprived of their freedoms just for wanting a better future for their children. This is a cruel system that criminalizes people who pose no danger to this country.
“My greatest challenge will be to continue working for my people, no matter where I’m at. I could say that my destiny lies now in the hands of an immigration judge in Atlanta --someone I have never met and someone who does not know my story -- and I may never be granted the opportunity to tell my story, but my destiny lies in the hands of the judge of judges, and I’m willing to accept His decision.
“Through this experience I have learned first-hand details about the treatment our immigrants receive before they are deported. How they keep the lights on day and night and you have to sleep with a towel over your eyes. How they make you lie in bed for 45 minutes, in what seems to be at random, after roll calling and you cannot use the phone or the bathroom during that time. How they would not let you know your attorney is on the phone.
DIMES FOR YOUR WORK
“How you get paid dimes for work, and you are on your own if you have no one outside adding funds to your commissary. How the visitation hours and your recreation hours happen at the time so you have to choose between seeing your family and getting some air. How the phones in the visitation room do not work and you have to scream through the soundproof windows. I will keep taking notes about my experience and I will keep on collecting my cellmates’ stories while I’m here.
“I am so fortunate that my family has the ability to travel to Jena, LA to see me. Many families, families like Jose’s, cannot travel to see him because they cannot afford the
trip. Many of my cellmate families cannot come to Louisiana because they cannot pay for it, or are too afraid to make the trip, or cannot come inside the facility because they
are undocumented themselves.
‘I MISS EVERYTHING’
“As for me, I miss my home. I miss everything I left behind. I miss my life before April 3, I miss being in touch with my people and reading their messages. It is extremely difficult being cut off from everyone back home, uninformed, and alone. I try to stay positive as much as I can, but it’s not easy being isolated, and sometimes I just fail.
“Thank you all of you who have shown solidarity with my story. Non-Profits, the press, who have given me their support. Thanks to my family. Thanks to all the people who have not abandoned me in this test. Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers. And finally, thanks to the team of lawyers who work to free me from this prison.
”Blessings, Manuel Duran.”
EMBEDDED JOURNALIST
With a journalist embedded in that setting, Department of Homeland Security has created in Duran a unique threat to unveil DHS practices and conditions inside a GEO Group Inc. detention facility. GEO Group has been sued for forcing detainees to labor for less than a dollar a day.
Recently, many reports have emerged alongside an apparent turning up of harsh immigration policies. In San Francisco, ICE spokesperson James Schwab resigned his position last month, saying he could not longer tell lies that Attorney General Jeff Sessions was requiring about persons rounded up being criminals.
ICE Spokesman Resigns, Citing Fabrications by Agency Chief, Sessions:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2018/03/13/ice-spokesman-resigns-over-false-statements-by-top-officials-about-calif-immigrant-arrests/?utm_term=.345be2b28173
The Trump administration apparently is putting together dossiers on journalists and activists.
ICE’s Tyrannical Campaign to Silence Dissent:
http://theweek.com/articles/761747/ices-tyrannical-campaign-silence-dissent
LINKS TO EARLIER STORIES AND VIDEOS
ICE Sends Memphis journalist to Louisiana facility, to dodge outrage, scrutiny:
www.dailykos.com/…
‘I came to Memphis, and all I got was this bruise.’
www.dailykos.com/…
Filmmaker Gary Moore operates the educational non-profit Citizens Media Resource and posts as FreeSpeechZone for Daily Kos.