Deadly methods used by U.S. Customs in deporting migrants

The agency’s use of full-body restraints during deportations has sparked outrage over what advocates describe as inhumane and degrading treatment.

A Nigerian migrant reported that ICE officers shackled the hands and feet of him and several others during their deportation, telling them they were being sent to Ghana — even though none of them were Ghanaian.

He said that when they asked to speak with their lawyers, ICE officers refused. The restrained migrants were then placed in tight-fitting restraint suits known as WRAPs and loaded onto a 16-hour flight to West Africa.

The use of the WRAP device — which immobilizes the entire body — has become a disturbing feature of some U.S. deportations.

The Nigerian migrant, who is part of a federal lawsuit, said from a detention center where he and others are being held: “The behavior of U.S. immigration officers was just like kidnapping.”

The Associated Press identified numerous cases in which ICE used the WRAP device during deportation flights. Several migrants reported being restrained in the device for hours at a time during 2020 deportations.

Despite internal warnings outlined in a 2023 report by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Civil Rights Division, ICE continued to use the device.

Part of the concern stems from reports of deaths linked to the use of the WRAP by law enforcement and detention officers.

According to the Associated Press, over the past decade, at least 12 deaths have been recorded in which local police or jail officers across the United States used the WRAP, and autopsies have confirmed that the restraint device played a role in those deaths.