According
to the Associated Press, a 16-year-old girl in a South Texas facility
took care of a four-year-old girl she didn’t know for at least three
days when they were kept in the same chain-link cage together.
The
teenager told the story to Michelle Brane, director of migrant rights
at the Women’s Refugee Commission, who spent time at the facility on
Friday.
“She had to teach other kids in the cell to change her diaper,” Brane said.
Agents
initially thought the four-year-old was younger, in part because she
wasn’t talking or communicating with anyone. As it turned out, the girl
only spoke K’iche, a language indigenous to Guatemala, and not Spanish.
“She was so traumatized that she wasn’t talking,” Brane told the Associated Press. “She was just curled up in a little ball.”
After
an attorney began asking questions about the girl’s situation, agents
found the girl’s aunt, who had been kept in a different part of the
facility, and reunited the two. The facility houses 1,100 adults and
children, but hundreds of children are reportedly kept apart from their
parents or other family members.
The Associated Press reported seeing one cage with 20 children inside.
chain-link cage
To be clear the chain-link cages have been around by ICE for over a
decade with children. What’s unique about the Trump era is that these
kids have parents that could take care of them but they’re being
separated by ICE at the border.
Important reminder that in addition to this horrendous story, children are also trying to kill themselves in these facilities:
During
his time at the shelter, children were running away, screaming,
throwing furniture and attempting suicide, Davidson said. Several were
being monitored this week because they were at risk of running away,
self-harm and suicide, records show.
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