At July’s Berks County Prison Board meeting, Judge Scott Lash defended continued cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement as a “few bad apples” situation. I respectfully disagree.
Just a few bad apples can be removed and we’d trust that the tree is healthy. But all evidence points to a problem at the roots.
Last year, ICE and Department of Homeland Security inspections identified deficiencies in detention facilities but lacked performance measures to determine whether inspection programs were working. As recently as June, the Government Accountability Office reported that ICE’s newest, largest facility failed to meet key standards, creating safety risks to detainees and staff.
That isn’t a few bad apples, it’s the whole tree.
I’m not saying every ICE employee is a bad person. I’m saying when good people participate in a system that produces harmful outcomes, it doesn’t make the system itself good.
Consider this as a moral question, not just a legal one.
When a system repeatedly fails to protect people in its custody, do we have an obligation to keep helping that system operate? Or do we have an obligation to step back and say, not in our name?
Lash has the authority to decide what role Berks County plays in this system.
He shouldn’t focus on “good apples” within ICE and instead examine the condition of the whole tree. When dignity, safety, and lives are at stake, “there are good people in the system” cannot be the moral justification for continuing to participate in it.
Kristin Park
Colebrookdale Township