After another man died while in ICE custody at the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Clearfield County, immigrant advocates held a press conference Monday, renewing their calls for the facility to be shut down.
Fouad Saeed Abdulkadir, 46, died at the Moshannon center after complaining of chest pain and being taken to the medical department, according to a news release from ICE, which says the cause of death is under investigation.
Advocates pointed to the death as the latest example of why they think the facility should not continue to operate. They say the facility is the site of human rights abuses including what they say is excess confinement and inadequate medical care.
“The health conditions at Moshannon have been highlighted for over a year, and the recent death was avoidable and should never have happened," said Elena Emelchin Brunner, an immigrant rights organizer at Asian Americans United and one of the people to speak during the online press conference.
The company Geo Group Inc. runs the Moshannon facility as an ICE detention center through a contract with Clearfield County.
Brunner and others said the county should end its contract with Geo and the facility should be shut down.
Adrianna Torres-García, the deputy director of the Free Migration Project, said Abdulkadir is the third person to die at the Moshannon site in the past three years, along with deaths at other facilities.
“This is truly a pattern, and it’s something no amount of oversight will restore," she said. "These men should be alive today.”
In August, Chaofeng Ge was found hanging in the shower at Moshannon. The death was ruled a suicide.
A citizen of Eritrea, Abdulkadir had been in ICE custody for 215 days.
