Immigration detention can imprison people who committed no crime

Evidence

But what this system means is that you can languish in prison for a long time without ever having committed a crime. And this is what angers Rasha more than anything else. Her liberty was taken away from her for no good reason. She hadn’t hurt anyone but was treated like a criminal, and she experienced firsthand the manner in which people in prison are treated. She felt powerless to change her situation and utterly unable to challenge her accusers. And when the presumption of guilt was summarily dumped on her, she felt stripped of her dignity. — Moustafa Bayoumi, How Does It Feel to Be a Problem? Being…, 159

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies what immigration detention actually does — holds people indefinitely without criminal charges — a distinction the broader law blurs.
• XREF: connects to: Indefinite immigration detention strands migrants in a jail-like purgatory without a release date. — Luke de Noronha, The conviviality of the overpoliced,…, 52; Undocumented presence in the United States is a civil, not criminal, offense — Andrew L. Whitehead, American Idolatry, 640; Ordinary immigration violations were repeatedly framed as terrorism with no proof — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 562 (+2 more)