Agency Jailed 6,500 Last Year

Dale Smith, www.blacklocks.ca
The Canada Border Services Agency last year jailed more than 6,500 people, new data show. The disclosure came as the Agency proposed to privatize supervision of detainees “on a case-by-case basis” using electronic anklets and GPS tracking.

The Agency yesterday told Blacklock’s it detained 6,514 people in 2015 including refugee claimants, travelers wanted on police warrants and foreigners subject to deportation. “Please note our data reports do not distinguish between the number of refugee claimants from the total number of individuals detained,” said spokesperson Line Guibert-Wolff.

“The reasons for detention were admissibility hearings; examination at a port of entry; Minister’s removal orders; and missing or invalid information,” Guibert-Wolff said. The average detention period was 24 days.

Fifteen people have died in Agency custody since 2000, by official estimate, including a 24-year old man held at the Edmonton Remand Centre last Friday. Details were withheld. Two other deaths were reported in March in Toronto and Milton, Ont.

“People have been detained, handcuffed, strip-searched and the list goes on at airports in Canada,” Senator George Baker (Liberal-Nfld. & Labrador), earlier told the Senate; “It’s absolutely outrageous what happens at our airports, especially with women coming back from nations that are tagged by that service; brought in; strip-searched and everything based on just a bare suspicion. It’s absolutely outrageous,” Baker said.

The Agency said it is soliciting proposals from “profit or non-profit corporations” to monitor detainees released from jail pending hearings. Contractors should “be prepared to operate on a national scale,” the Agency wrote in a notice Management & Provision Of Community-Based Supervision Of Immigration Clientele.

“The Agency is seeking feedback from industry with respect to the management and provision of a risk management-based Alternative To Detention program including a community supervision program supported with electronic supervision tools for persons detained under the Immigration & Refugee Protection Act,” Supervision said.

“This would include on-site and awake staff 24 hours per day at any residential facilities; periodically checking individual residents, activities and destinations while the resident is away from the facility and record the results of these checks; monitoring clients’ behaviour and reporting any violation of conditions of release”; and “reporting to the Agency if a client cannot be located within an established and agreed-upon time frame,” the notice continued.

Electronic anklets would be required for “approximately 600 clients across Canada at any one time”. The Agency cautioned that private contractors “would be required to provide on a case-by-case basis enhanced services or specialized programs to support the release of high-risk offenders including those with mental health issues.”

“This population of clients may have extensive history of violence and violent crimes; sexual offenders; affiliations with gangs and organized crime; substance abuse histories and problems; mental health disorders; and propensity to abscond,” concluded Supervision.