Legal Aid Groups Sue Office of Refugee Resettlement

On April 16, 2018, the Center for Human Rights & Constitutional Law, the National Center for Youth Law, and the Immigration Clinic of the University of California at Davis sued the Office of Refugee Resettlement, alleging that the following policies and practices violate the Flores settlement:

1. ORR’s policy and practice to “step up” detained youth from shelters to staff-secure, secure and residential treatment centers without providing youth meaningful notice and an opportunity to be heard regarding the agency’s justification for step-up.

2. ORR’s policy and practice to administer powerful psychotropic medications to detained youth regardless of their wishes and without securing their parents’ consent.

3. ORR’s policy and practice to deny or delay detained children’s release on the grounds their parents or other available custodians are or may harm or neglect them without providing meaningful notice and an opportunity to be heard regarding a potential custodian’s actual propensity to harm or neglect.

Plaintiffs’ brief and publicly available evidence supporting the motion are available here.

Questions regarding this litigation or reports of similar violations may be directed to the Center’s General Counsel, Carlos Holguín, crholguin@centerforhumanrights.org.