10.20.07
Hutto Walk III, Protesters To Walk From Taylor To Georgetown
Hutto Walk III will begin next Sunday (October 28th) at the T. Don Hutto facility in Taylor and continue until Tuesday (October 30th) when the protesters arrive in Georgetown for the Williamson County Commissioners Court meeting that day. Excerpts below from this article in the Williamson County Sun, Rally against T. Don will head to Georgetown.
Jay J. Johnson-Castro with Del Rio-based Freedom Ambassadors, a human rights network, and coordinator of the walk against what they call a prison for children, said this week that he will be walking in protest of the facility beginning October 28:
After a noon news conference that day at T. Don Hutto, 1001 Welch St., Mr. Johnson said those who choose to walk with him will walk from the front entrance of the detainee center and go together about 19 miles to Commissioners Court, 301 S:E. Inner Loop in Georgetown, arriving in time for court at 9:30 a.m. on October 30.
Other people joining him for at least part of the. walk will include representatives from the Dallas Peace Center; Cesar Chavez March for Justice in Sari Antonio; ; and chapters of the League of United Latin American Citizens – in Taylor, Austin and Sari Antonio, Mr. Johnson said.
[...]
Mr. Johnson said the walk has different facets to it.
“It brings we the people together to a point of activity,” he said regarding people opposed to keeping families in the T. Don Hutto Center in Taylor, where illegal immigrant families are kept while waiting to be deported. .
He said the walk is also to make people aware of their opinions on T. Don Hutto.
“We consider media one of the powers of ‘our country,” Mr. Johnson added.
They definitely want to voice their opinions in Commissioners Court, he said.
“We’re going after the Williamson County Commissioners Court,” he said. And we believe we have a case.”
Mr. Johnson said he believes the county’s involvement with the facility had to do with money rather than human rights.
“We hope they think beyond liability,” he said.
Once whoever is walking arrives at Commissioners Court on October 30, Mr. Johnson said he is not sure how many people could join the protest or what exactly will happen:
One thing he knew for sure: “We anticipate going to court and making public comment,” he said. “We want the facility shut down.”
The more media attention T. Don Hutto gets the better. The more people find out about what’s happening at T. Don Hutto the harder it will be for the county to hide behind their phony arguments to justify profiting from this situation.
remerson said,
October 20, 2007 at 9:48 pm
Should be a good opportunity to involve all who support real American family values, not the horribly distorted impersonation of them being practiced by those who imprison children. Some well-circulated “errors” that need to be clarified:
1. No one at TDH is charged with a crime. (They are simply charged with a civil violation of immigration law.– less serious than the on-going violations of the Open Meetings Act by the commissioners , and no one’s suggested they be placed in detention!)
2. Many TDH prisoners enter the country legally! (Don’t fall into the “W” attitude; we have way too much of that going on in this county!)
3. It is a stereotypical myth bordering on bigotry that all these prisoners are poor, ignorant, etc. (Marginalizing is a tool to make it easier to get away with this bad treatment; don’t fall for it!)
4. This is definitely a prison (a place where people are held against their will and privileges restricted); the fact that they are held there absent criminal charges is the part that doesn’t fit. Matter of fact, that may be the only truly “illegal” part of their presence here!
5. Mast prisoners are simply awaiting their hearing for residency or amnsety; they’re being processed by a broken system.
They are our fellow human beings and they need our support.
remerson said,
October 20, 2007 at 10:21 pm
Post Script:
New website that is unfinished but very informative at this moment: Check out the Hutto Journal!
http://childreninjail.com/
sdana said,
October 20, 2007 at 11:21 pm
This may be our last chance to influence Williamson County commissioners before they vote to continue imprisoning children in exchange for $250,000 worth of liability insurance from CCA.
There will be a press conference at T. Don Hutto, 1001 Welch St. in Taylor at noon on Sunday October 28. Hutto Walk III will begin at 1p.m. and we will walk from the prison down Hwy 95 to Hwy. 29. At 9 a.m. Monday, October 29, we will walk from Hwy 29 at 95 to the Georgetown city limits. At 8 a.m. on Tuesday we will walk from the Inner Loop intersection with Hwy 29 to the Williamson County Annex to attend the 9:30 a.m. commissioners court meeting.
Please join us at the prison, on any part of the walk and/or let the commissioners know how you feel about the prison during the citizen input portion of the meeting at 9:30a.m. on Tuesday. For more info. contact Jay Johnson-Castro at jay@villadelrio.com.
remerson said,
October 21, 2007 at 10:58 am
ctyjudge@wilco.org,lbirkman@wilco.org,clong@wilco.org,rmorrison@wilco.org,vcovey@wilco.org
Jay said,
October 21, 2007 at 3:06 pm
If folks in Williamson County find the imprisonment of innocent children shocking and revolting, it is their democratic privilege to take control of their political subdivision that is complicit with this international crime. I am personally encouraged by the outpouring of oppositon by the good citizens of WC…of all faiths and ethnic backgrounds…who have been displaying the courage to stand up to this kind of terrorism on their home turf.
While hundreds and thousands of us are not residents of WC, we feel a moral and humanitarian responsibility to defeat this American and international tragedy being committed in Taylor. The elitist-supremacists knew just what they were doing by putting innocent children and their mothers in a hidden prison in a little know rural city like Taylor. But the world is zeroing in now…not on the prison so much as on those who are “unanimously complicit” with this most immoral and inhumane act…the individual county commissioners. Shame is going to bare down on them…especially when the rest of Texans, Americans and the international community learn how this came about and why…and for how much money!
When we look at the history of the WCCC in relation to the imprisonment of the hundred of child victims we observe a classic case of moral bankruptcy and totally callous consciences. Back in January, when the children were in cold prison cells for 23 hours a day, with repugnant food, prison uniforms and in some cases isolated from their mothers…we asked the WCCC to champion the children and not renew the lease with CCA and pull out of the contract with ICE and shut Hutto down. They WCCC we so enamored by Hutto that they renewed the expiring one year lease for two more years.
Now that the courts have scathed ICE, CCA…all they are worried about is their own fannies. Sorry! Too lates. The heat is about to get cranked up big time. There will be no retroactive grace. These professed Christians better go to the one who can forgive their sins against humanity…and repent. They have betrayed us all.
It hit me one day. This 60-y-o man flashed back on a Sunday School song. We sang it at one of the Hutto vigils.
“Jesus loves the little children. All the children of the world.
Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight
Jesus love the little children of the world”.
In Hutto there have been children from upwards of 50 different countries. When we first started protesting Hutto back in December, the often comment was that they were from Mexico and should all be sent back with their mothers. Like that justified the criminal act of imprisoning innocence. Now…according to the WCCC…they must all be from Latin America…or El Salvador. Like that justifies inhumanity to man. The WCCC hasn’t come a long way baby. They are the very kind of people that shock the conscience of decent Americans…and citizens of our common home…Planet Earth.
Now…where’s the mother that was sexually assaulted? Does anyone on the WCCC care. Have they cared enought to intervene in her behalf. How about her child or children? Word has it the the guard who sexually assaulted her had committed similar acts. Where is he? Is he on the outside while she might still be imprisoned or even conveniently deported so as to bury the evidence.
Where are the family counselors and therapists? Have they been brought in to inspect the emotional welfare of the women and children? If not…why not? Can the henchman Chertoff override event such human concerns?
To the WCCC. We aint’ goin’ away. We’re comin’ after you. You have on last chance to do the honorable, humane, American and Christian thing.
Jay