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DIVERSITY EMPLOYERS MAGAZINE
Spring 2011 - Anniversary Commemorative Issue

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Ice on Immigration: Religious Services for Immigrants in Detention

By L. Patricia Ice, Featured Columnist

Question: My friend is detained and languishing in an immigration detention facility in Louisiana. He and I practice the same religion. We are very devout in our religious practices and beliefs. The detention facility arranges religious services for people of other faiths but none for ours. Ours is a major world religion, but the number of its followers in the United States is less than 1 million. How can my friend get the detention facility to arrange religious services for our faith?

Answer: Advise your incarcerated friend to speak to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) official or another worker assigned to his case about his need for religious services of his faith while being detained. If that does not work, advise your friend to ask a BIA (Board of Immigration Appeals) accredited representative or immigration attorney to help with his request. A spokesperson for ICE recently told me that ICE tries to accommodate the religious needs of detained individuals if possible.

L. Patricia Ice

Featured IMDiversity Immigration Columnist L. Patricia Ice is an attorney and counselor who has taught immigration law at Mississippi College School of Law in Jackson, and also contributes regular immigration advice stories to La Noticia and The Jackson Advocate. A practicing attorney, Ms. Ice is a former Equal Justice Works Katrina Legal Fellow, focusing on immigrant family and employment issues in areas around the Gulf Coast. Ms. Ice trains law students in the extern program of the Mississippi College School of law. She is also dedicated to immigrants rights advocacy, and serves as the Director of the Legal Project of the non-profit rights education group, MIRA: The Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance at www.yourmira.org.

IMDiversity.com is committed to presenting diverse points of view. However, the viewpoint expressed in this article is the opinion of the author and is not necessarily the viewpoint of the owners or employees at IMD.