Editorial | The silence is deafening from ICE | amNewYork

"Chaofeng Ye, a Queens resident, was arrested in Pennsylvania back in January for alleged credit card fraud. Because he was a Chinese national, he was transferred into ICE custody and locked up in a Keystone State detention center. On Aug. 5, Ye was found hanging inside a shower at the Mohannon Valley Detention Center."

"His family back in Queens has been working for months with attorneys to learn the circumstances of his death. To date, neither ICE nor its parent agency, the federal Department of Homeland Security, has provided any answers. Ye's brother and family attorneys sought to bring attention to their case during a press conference outside 26 Federal Plaza, the Lower Manhattan immigration court where for months, ICE agents have apprehended law-abiding immigrants obeying court orders to attend mandated hearings about their immigration cases."

"ICE has largely kept the public in the dark as to why the individuals were detained, including where and how they are being detained. The lack of transparency from ICE and the DHS about immigrant detentions is unprecedented in modern American history. It has only served to enhance the public fear of both agencies spurred by months of videos of masked ICE agents roughly accosting immigrants, photographers and politicians at Federal Plaza, on the streets of Chinatown and Washington Heights, and in other American cities. In response to inquiries about Ye's death, the DHS issued a boilerplate statement in which it feigned remorse and intolerance of in-custody deaths, and that the agency was still looking into it."

Chaofeng Ye, a Queens resident, was arrested in Pennsylvania in January on alleged credit card fraud and then transferred to ICE custody as a Chinese national. On Aug. 5, Ye was found hanging inside a shower at the Mohannon Valley Detention Center. His family and attorneys have sought information about the circumstances of his death, but ICE and the Department of Homeland Security have provided no answers. Family members and attorneys held a press conference outside 26 Federal Plaza to draw attention to Ye's case and broader patterns of ICE apprehensions. Ongoing secrecy and videos of aggressive ICE tactics have heightened public fear, while DHS issued a boilerplate statement promising investigation without substantive transparency or accountability.

Read at www.amny.com