HRB suggests incident not isolated but result of predatory culture; Immigration Dept says matter was investigated
“Someone has to have the courage to bring it to an end”
NASSAU, BAHAMAS — Human Rights Bahamas (HRB) yesterday called for the immediate removal of all male officers from the Department of Immigration’s “safe house” and demanded a full investigation into claims of sexual assault of detainees at the facility.
The call follows recent allegations by a 27-year-old Surinamese woman that she was drugged and raped by an immigration officer.
The allegations were outlined in a writ filed in the Supreme Court on May 11, which claimed the woman was unlawfully arrested, falsely imprisoned, assaulted, battered, drugged, sexually assaulted, raped, sodomized and deprived of her constitutional rights.
“This comes as the highly disturbing allegations of a detainee being drugged and raped by a male officer are now being compounded with new information reaching HRB, suggesting a series of similar attacks on female victims at that facility in the past several months,” the advocacy group said in a statement.
“A picture is emerging, is not of one or two isolated incidents, but rather an organized, practiced and premeditated scheme of drugging and raping detainees, perpetrated by a small group of officers.
“Information from former detainees also reveals a highly toxic wider culture of drunkenness and predatory behavior among the male officers generally, who regularly sexually harass and intimidate female detainees, watch them while they are showering and violate their right to privacy, safety and dignity in countless other ways. Meanwhile, the female officers look the other way.
“We expect further lawsuits to be filed in due course and have full confidence [in] the Bahamas Judiciary to ensure the justice is done in each case.”
In a statement last month on the same matter, the Department of Immigration said there was “no substance” to the allegations.
The department said an investigation into the incident by its Corruption, Complaints and Intelligence Unit, along with the Royal Bahamas Police Force’s Sexual Offenses Unit, was concluded.
It claimed the woman denied that she was assaulted and requested to be deported.
“To be certain, the female migrant, the subject of the alleged inappropriate conduct, has made no complaint of and denied the occurrence of any inappropriate conduct. Further, the female insists on her immediate repatriation,” the department said.
According to the writ, the victim was interviewed by immigration officers on April 18 but was told that she would remain under detention until the incident was investigated.
She was reportedly “extremely fearful” she would not be allowed to go home and was also refused legal representation.
The defendant went on a hunger strike in the days after the interview and was subsequently deported from The Bahamas on or around April 25.
The defendants named in the matter include Attorney General Carl Bethel, Minister of Immigration Elsworth Johnson, Director of Immigration Clarence Russell, Officer in Charge of the Carmichael Road Detention Center Peter Joseph and Immigration Officer Davon Adderley.
Immediate action
HRB yesterday sought to remind the government that the immigration safe house was created by order of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) because there was no safe place for women and children in the Immigration Department’s custody.
“To say this dismal facility is failing to live up to its purpose may be the understatement of the year,” the statement said.
“Instead of being held in safety, these women and children have been rendered into the clutches of predators.
“In addition to removing all male officers from active duty at the safe house, they should also explicitly be barred from entry at any other time, and a full review and investigation of the activities and culture among those officers must be launched immediately.”
The group added: “The reluctance of successive administrations to deal with the rogue agency which the Bahamas Immigration Department has become serves as active encouragement for officers to continue to behave as if they are a law unto themselves and treat detainees as if they are worthless, have no rights and can be physically and sexually abused at will.
“Someone has to have the courage to bring it to an end.”
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