Jul 30
2025
Another bad review for ICE’s Batavia detention center
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For a third time in the past two years, federal inspectors have found that guards at the local ICE detention center in Batavia improperly used force against the immigrants held there.
Investigative Post in February reported on two recent federal audits that found incidents where officers were quick to use pepper spray and manhandle detainees instead of deescalating tense situations.
Now, a June report from the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general found two additional instances where guards violated the use-of-force policy against detainees.
On one occasion, a detainee was locked in his cell, handcuffed. Officers arrived to remove the handcuffs, but the detainee refused to come to the cell door to allow for their removal. Officers then pepper-sprayed the man, entered the cell “and pinned the detainee to his bunk to remove [the] hand restraints.”
In a second incident, officers sought to relocate a detainee involved in a hunger strike from his cell to a medical observation unit. When the detainee refused, officers entered the cell, “forcibly placed” the man on the floor and cuffed him.
In both cases, the DHS Office of the Inspector General concluded that, “because this detainee did not pose a threat to himself or others, officers should have followed calculated use of force procedures.”
Advocates and attorneys said the report tracks with what they’ve heard directly from detainees.
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“The inappropriate use of force that was found in the audit are consistent with what the people who were actually detained in the facility have been saying,” said Sarah Gillman, an attorney with RFK Human Rights who represents people detained at the Batavia facility. “I think it just reaffirms that what they are saying is accurate.”
The latest audit is the result of an unannounced inspection of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in September and the first in recent years by the inspector general. ICE’s Office of Professional Standards conducted the prior reviews.
In the June report, the inspector general’s office found a litany of issues in addition to the improper uses of force. Among them: There’s no full-time doctor or dentist on staff at the Batavia facility. Because detainees must be taken elsewhere for specialty medical appointments, the result is a significant backlog.
ICE, the report found, also failed to:
- Respond to detainee grievances in a timely manner;
- Provide outdoor recreation equipment to those held in solitary confinement;
- Provide an orientation video in a language and at a volume detainees could understand;
- Properly separate detainees with no criminal history from those with conviction records.
ICE refuted none of the IG’s findings and agreed to make adjustments to how it operates in Batavia. In addition to ICE, contractor Akima Global Services provides the facility with officers. With regard to use of force incidents, ICE agreed to update “its Use of Force policy and provides annual refresher training on de-escalation tactics.”
In a statement, an ICE spokesperson said the agency “is committed to ensuring that all those in our custody reside in safe, secure, and humane environments and under appropriate conditions of confinement.”
ICE detentions have increased four-fold in Western and Upstate New York during President Donald Trump’s second term. As a result, the 650-bed detention center in Batavia has been near or over capacity on a regular basis, peaking at a population of 740 in June.
Other issues found
The inspector general’s report highlighted other deficiencies by ICE at Batavia.
For one, the federal auditors noted, detainee complaints aren’t taken as seriously as they should be. While officers provided initial responses to grievances filed by detainees, replying within the required five days, they failed to provide more substantive responses when detainees appealed for further review. That occurred in 19 out of 29 cases reviewed by the inspectors.
In response, ICE said it would conduct daily checks of grievances to ensure detainees are responded to in a timely manner.
The IG’s office also noted that while detainees held in solitary confinement were permitted to go outside, their yard was merely a fenced-in slab of concrete with no exercise or sporting equipment. In response, ICE said it would provide “handballs, basketballs, and soccer balls during recreation time” if detainees request those items.
ICE uses solitary confinement in Batavia at a rate that rivals its largest detention centers in the country and for periods of time that meet the definition of torture, data reviewed by Investigative Post found.
Donate to support our nonprofit newsroomThe inspector general also noted that Batavia has no doctor and no dentist on staff full-time. As a result, all specialty medical care must be done off-site and Batavia must rely on ICE’s regional dentist. As a result, the backlog for both medical and dental appointments are months long. The agency contracts with ICE Health Service Corps for medical services.
The regional dentist, the report noted, only visits every three to four months and there was a five-month delay for off-site appointments.
It’s a similar situation for off-site medical appointments: “As of September 10, 2024, the facility’s medical scheduler reported a backlog of 150 specialty appointments scheduled through February 2025.”
In response, ICE said the agency “is actively recruiting for a physician and dentist” and noted it awarded a contract last fall “to provide additional medical staffing.” However, the agency admitted, it won’t have a doctor and dentist on staff until the spring of 2026.
The ICE spokesperson noted further that, “all detainees in ICE custody have access to appropriate medical, dental, and mental health care, including emergency services.”
A pattern of abuse
Prior reviews of the Batavia facility have also found troubling instances of guards using force on detainees in ways that violated policy.
An October 2024 report by ICE’s Office of Professional Responsibility, for example, found three instances where officers were quick to pepper-spray detainees and forcibly remove them from their cells. The auditors found that “in all three incidents, staff did not take the time to assess the possibility of resolving the situation without resorting to force before they deployed chemical agents, entered the rooms, and forcibly removed the detainees.”
Similarly, a June 2023 audit found that ICE considered a detainee’s placement in solitary confinement to justify shackling them whenever they left their cell. The practice violated the agency’s standard, which is to use restraints on a person only when necessary, the review found. The Batavia facility uses solitary confinement more than every other ICE facility in the country, save for four. Currently ICE operates in 126 facilities nationwide. Among other reasons, detainees in Batavia have been placed in solitary confinement as punishment for engaging in a hunger strike and for medical purposes.
Detainees interviewed by Investigative Post have alleged that ICE officers are known to beat them up if they don’t comply with orders.
One man, who has since been deported to Mali, alleged in a civil rights complaint that Batavia officers beat and kicked him, leaving him with broken fingers, after he refused to sign “deportation papers.” After being picked up and thrown to the ground, the man, Lansine Sidibe, “was left with severe injuries to his back, abdomen, hands and knees.” Sidibe had been an asylum seeker with no criminal history. He was in ICE custody because he failed an entrance interview when he arrived at a legal port of entry.
“They tried to handcuff me and they broke my fingers, my knees cut and bleeding,” Sidibe said in the complaint.
Gillman, in an interview with Investigative Post, said ICE treats the Batavia facility as a criminal detention center, not the civil one it is. That’s caused “a culture of either overuse of force or threatened use of force” to fester, she said.
“The use of force is just something that has been prevalent there for a very long time,” Gillman said.
The audit, she said, confirms that what detainees have reported is true.
“What people who are detained there are saying is true, and it’s been documented,” she said. “It just shows that the evidence is clear.”
