MORRIS COUNTY, NJ — The Department of Homeland Security has admitted to processing immigrants for deportation at a Morris County warehouse, which it was court-ordered not to do, according to state officials.
According to Congresswoman Analilia Mejia (NJ-11), the DHS confirmed that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents had used the parking lot of the federal government's Roxbury warehouse facility to stage and process 14 detained people on two separate occasions in September.
The revelation comes after weeks of rumors that were substantiated enough to prompt an investigation from the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. The federal agency was directed by a court order not to have the property used for detaining or processing immigrants.
Furthermore, the admission comes after Project No ICE in North Jersey Alliance (NINJA), a group of organizations resisting the warehouse's conversion into a detention/processing facility, said it has submitted evidence to the AG's office that ICE is violating the court order.
"DHS has finally admitted what we suspected all along: ICE used the Roxbury property to process and stage detainees on multiple occasions, potentially in violation of a court order restricting its use as an immigration detention facility," Mejia said. "After weeks of denying that the property was being used for immigration enforcement operations, DHS has finally confirmed to my office that ICE used the site to process 14 detained individuals on September 4 and 8."
Mejia calls the incidents "no accident," saying that ICE deliberately misled Roxbury and New Jersey by handling operations without "supervisory knowledge."
"According to communications with my office, only after whistleblowers raised concerns did they cease activity," Mejia said. "ICE does not get to cherry-pick which laws to follow... ICE cannot be trusted to police itself. An agency that operates with impunity and answers to a Secretary who encourages suffering in detention must be abolished and replaced with a fair, just, and humane immigration system that respects due process and human dignity."
Patch has reached out to ICE for comment and has not heard back at this time.
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