DILLEY, Texas – Families inside a South Texas detention facility protested for freedom, an immigration attorney told KSAT Investigates.
The Frio County Sheriff’s office confirmed to KSAT that deputies were called out to the South Texas Family Residential Center just before 1 p.m. on Saturday.
The sheriff said Texas Department of Public Safety and Border Patrol officers also responded, adding that the protest lasted about half an hour.
Eric Lee, an immigration attorney with Lee & Godshall-Bennett, LLP, told KSAT he was at the facility to visit his clients.
When he was in the waiting room, Lee said guards who “looked very distressed” ordered everyone to leave. Lee took video of the scene as he headed towards his car.
“I started hearing all these children shouting,” Lee said. “I wasn’t sure of what it was at first, and then I started to hear that they were shouting ‘let us out, let us out’ or ‘libertad.’”
The protest happened in the same detention center where a 5-year-old boy from Minnesota was taken last week after being detained by immigration officers.
According to Lee, speaking out can pose a risk to detainees.
“To express their First Amendment right, to seek redress of the U.S. government for the conditions that they’re facing, I was inspired.”
Last year, KSAT Investigates reported on a lawsuit alleging inhuman conditions inside the facility, including issues with food, water and medical care.
Immigration attorneys with clients in the facility told KSAT this week that it has not changed.
U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Connecticut) said he was blocked from inspecting the Dilley detention center last week, but met with recent detainees and “heard about inhumane conditions within the facility.”
On Friday, Rep. Tony Gonzales, whose district includes the Dilley center, said he has seen the “state-of-the-art facilities” himself.
“I’ve been there & seen the state-of-the-art facilities & protocols that (ICE) follows,” Gonzales said in the X post. “Our ICE agents & CBP (U.S. Customs and Border Protection) personnel are doing their jobs.”
KSAT reached out to the Department of Homeland Security three times since Saturday to ask about the protest and the allegations of inhumane conditions. A spokeswoman did not respond to our request by the deadline.
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