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News and Reports

The content on this page comes from contributors and from Goodis Center staff, interns, and volunteers.  The Goodis Center will also occasionally publish press releases—both our own and those from other organizations and agencies—here.

For full reports and essays related to The Goodis Center’s research, please view this archive.

Notice:
We are in the process of updating our website to add older content to our archives, and we are preparing to resume publishing new content in the summer of 2015.  Please continue to check back for updates.


In addition to the content published directly on our site, The Goodis Center syndicates headlines from other content providers.  Please check out our Syndicated Content category to browse headlines.


 

Abu Ghraib: Will anyone be held accountable?

February 5, 2015 By TheGoodisCenter Leave a Comment

via Center for Constitutional Rights on facebook:
“Detainees under American control were raped, beaten, shocked, stripped, starved of food and sleep, hung by their wrists, threatened with death and, in at least one case, murdered. These are war crimes, punishable under both American and international law.” The New York Times on what is at stake in the Center for Constitutional Rights‘ court argument tomorrow regarding the role of private military contractor CACI in the abuse and torture that took place at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

Photo in the Public Domain  November 2003 - Hooded detainee with wires attached to hands and genitalia stands on a box; the detainee was told that he would be electrocuted if he fell off the box. Staff Sgt. Ivan "Chip" Frederick, at right, clips his fingernails.
Photo in the Public Domain
November 2003 – Hooded detainee with wires attached to hands and genitalia stands on a box; the detainee was told that he would be electrocuted if he fell off the box.
Staff Sgt. Ivan “Chip” Frederick, at right, clips his fingernails.

The Editorial Board of The New York Times ran a featured piece today entitled “Will Anyone Pay for Abu Ghraib?”

Tomorrow, a federal trial court in Virginia will consider whether two contractors — CACI International Inc. and L-3 Services Inc. — can be sued in American courts for damages relating to their operations at Abu Ghraib.

Read the full Times article here.

Filed Under: Current Events Tagged With: Corporate Accountability, prisons, torture

The Goodis Center Now a Bronze Participant in GuideStar Exchange

February 4, 2015 By TheGoodisCenter Leave a Comment

For Immediate Release

The Goodis Center Has Reached the GuideStar Exchange Bronze Participation Level as a
Demonstration of Its Commitment to Transparency

February 4, 2015
SILVER SPRING, MD – The Goodis Center for Research and Reform, Inc., today received the GuideStar Exchange Bronze participation level, a leading symbol of transparency and accountability provided by GuideStar USA, Inc., the premier source of nonprofit information. This level demonstrates The Goodis Center’s deep commitment to nonprofit transparency and accountability.

“We have worked hard to showcase our progress toward our mission, and our long-held belief in being transparent about our work, to our constituents,” said Robert Goodis, The Goodis Center’s Executive Director. “As a GuideStar Exchange participant, we use their platform to share a wealth of up-to-date information about our work to our supporters and GuideStar’s immense online audience of nonprofits, grantmakers, individual donors, and the media.”

In order to be awarded the GuideStar Exchange logo, The Goodis Center had to fill out every required field of our nonprofit report page on www.guidestar.org for the Bronze level of participation.

“I encourage you to check out our profile on GuideStar to see what we’re all about,” added Robert. “We are engaged in a number of initiatives, and we are thrilled to have another platform for communicating our advancement and progress.”

In his capacity as the executive director, Robert Goodis said he also planned to pursue a higher participation level with the GuideStar Exchange initiative in the future:

“We are preparing to enter a new stage with our programs.  We’re working on expanding and rejuvenating some of our ongoing projects, and also preparing to launch some new programs that we’ve had in development for some time now.  This is an exciting time for The Goodis Center, and our expansion will make it easier to share our impact with GuideStar and our supporters.”

The Bronze Participant badge now appears on The Goodis Center’s official website, which is in the middle of a major overhaul.

About the GuideStar Exchange

The GuideStar Exchange is an initiative designed to connect nonprofits with current and potential supporters. With millions of people coming to GuideStar to learn more about nonprofit organizations, the GuideStar Exchange allows nonprofits to share a wealth of up-to-date information with GuideStar’s many audiences. Becoming a GuideStar Exchange participant is free of charge. To join, organizations need to update their report pages, completing all required fields for participation. The GuideStar Exchange level logos, acknowledged as symbols of transparency in the nonprofit sector, are displayed on all Exchange participants’ nonprofit reports.

The Goodis Center for Research and Reform, Inc.

###

News Contact: Robert Goodis

 


 


 

 


 

Filed Under: Announcements

White House Statement on Violence in Mali

March 22, 2012 By TheGoodisCenter Leave a Comment

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

March 22, 2012

Statement by the Press Secretary on Mali

The United States strongly condemns the violence initiated by elements of the armed forces of Mali. We call for the immediate restoration of constitutional rule in Mali, including full civilian authority over the armed forces and respect for the country’s democratic institutions and traditions. The United States stands by the people of Mali and the legitimately elected government of President Amadou Toumani Touré. We welcome the strong statements by the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States condemning this unconstitutional seizure of power.

Filed Under: Current Events

That Day God Visits You

March 22, 2012 By Nick Mwaluko Leave a Comment

Two excerpts from my working script S/He (pronounced ze) appeared in Volume 2, Issue 1, of Journal for Human Advancement.  This piece, entitled “That Day God Visits You,” is a third in that series.

To view the preceding content from S/He, please check out the Journal online or on CD via The Goodis Center.

Readers can view the PDF of this third part below.

-Nick Mwaluko

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Filed Under: Journal for Human Advancement Tagged With: Art, Gender and Sexuality, Human Rights

ICE TO OPEN NEW IMMIGRATION DETENTION FACILITY IN TEXAS THIS VALENTINE’S DAY

February 12, 2012 By Robert Goodis Leave a Comment

When I revamped The Goodis Center’s website, I decided to also wipe out my blog and start over from scratch.  Having done that, this marks my first entry on the new Goodis Center blog.  The subject of this inaugural blogpost is a new immigration detention facility in Karnes County, Texas, which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will be opening this Tuesday, Valentine’s Day.  How romantic…

In early 2010, I began an intensive study of documented human rights abuses in United States immigration detention facilities, focusing on one facility near Tacoma, WA, and another near Taylor, TX.  My research is ongoing, but I hope to update and expand the report over the next few months and release it to the public in due time.  Until that research is complete, I’ll refrain from making too many broad statements about the current state of this nation’s immigration enforcement practices.

What I will say, however, is that the Karnes County detention center merits a critical eye from the public.

ICE is touting the new facility—the first facility designed and constructed with consideration for the agency’s 2009 commitment to reform the immigration detention system and shift away from its longtime reliance on jails and jail-like facilities—as a model for reform.  That 2009 public commitment came after years of independent and governmental reviews raised one red flag after another, reporting inconsistencies between facilities and varying levels of human rights abuses throughout the immigration detention system nationwide.  Considering the gravity of the situation, and the amount of time ICE has had to effect reform, we should expect nothing less than a model facility.

Unfortunately, ICE has a history of failing to live up to their promises.  The T. Don Hutto Family Residential Facility opened in 2006 after ICE retrofitted a county jail in Texas to become a first-of-its-kind family detention center.  The idea behind the detention center, which is one of the subjects of my ongoing study, was to keep detained families together, rather than separating children from their parents and spouses from their partners.

In reality, ICE and the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA)—a private corrections corporation that maintains prisons and detention centers across the country—had no idea what they were getting into.  Detaining small children in a former county jail proved troublesome and, as many independent reviews cited, dangerous for the children.  Guards were not trained to deal with children, and the resulting circumstances outraged the local community to the point of protests outside the detention center’s gates chanting “T. Don Hutto has got to go!”

Admitting their mistake, ICE closed their celebrated family detention center and reopened it as a women-only detention center in 2009, again touting the place as a model for reform.  A short time later, allegations of rape and other abuses began to surface.  While one guard was arrested and convicted for multiple assaults, many questions remain as to the viability of the detention center and its place as a “model facility.”

Given these trends, there’s no telling whether ICE has learned from its mistakes, or whether it’s just going to keep making more of them.  While the new facility in Karnes County is being lauded by ICE officials for moving decisively away from jails and jail-like facilities, many questions remain.  As a recent release from Human Rights First explains:

In October 2011 Human Rights First released its report, “Jails and Jumpsuits: Transforming the US Immigration Detention System – A Two-Year Review.” In it were recommendations for ICE’s successful switch to this new detention model. It included the following findings:

  • More “normalized” conditions in detention are actually touted as best practice in the corrections context and can help increase safety inside a facility;
  • Despite its 2009 reform commitments, the United States continues to hold the overwhelming majority of its nearly 400,000 detained asylum seekers and other civil immigration law detainees in jails and jail-like facilities across the country;
  • A full 50 percent of immigration detainees are held in actual jails, a proportion that has not decreased in the past two years;
  • U.S. taxpayers will spend more than $2 billion to maintain this system in 2012 – more than 28 times ICE’s budget for more cost-effective Alternatives to Detention, which save more than $110 per detainee per day; and
  • Many of the individuals whom ICE will hold at the new facility are appropriate candidates for Alternatives to Detention or community-based release programs.

New Karnes County Immigration Detention Facility Touted as Model for Reform
(emphasis added)

Furthermore, groups such as Human Rights First which will have representatives inspecting the new facility on Valentine’s Day are already raising some serious concerns over the new facility, particularly in relation to the detainees’ due process rights.

 

Karnes County is located one hour from San Antonio and two hours from Austin. Detainees at Karnes will reportedly have their removal cases heard via video-conference rather than in person, because there will be no immigration judges on site. Legal service providers in Austin and San Antonio are under-resourced to meet the legal needs of hundreds of new detainees in the region.

“If Congress is going to fund detention and removal, they also need to provide funding for immigration judges to hear their cases – in person – and for detainees to receive basic legal information through the Legal Orientation Program at all detention facilities, including Karnes,” says Epstein. “While we welcome the development of a facility with conditions more appropriate for civil immigration detainees, ICE should not open any new facility without immigration judges in place, and adequately funded legal resources available.”

ibid

That said, here’s hoping ICE got it right this time.

The Karnes facility will be maintained by ICE and the GEO Group, Inc., another private corrections and detention company similar to the CCA.

If you want to learn more about the facilities mentioned in this blog, stay tuned for updates on the book I’m preparing on this subject.  In the meantime, a quick Google search will get you a ton of results.  Or, if you’re more moved by video, check out The Least of These, a documentary about the former family detention center in Texas.

Filed Under: Current Events Tagged With: Corporate Responsibility, Human Rights, Immigration, Immigration Detention, International Law

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