Texas Town Shuts INS Office, Charges Filth, Crowding

City officials on Friday evicted the Immigration and Naturalization Service from a building where thousands of Central Americans apply for asylum each week, accusing the INS of not complying with the fire code and failing to clean up litter and human waste around the building.

The fire marshal and police officers cleared the building, then locked the two main entrances and sealed a third with duct tape. A notice was put on the building saying that it is not safe for habitation. About 100 Central Americans and some INS employees stood outside the padlocked building as policemen turned away arriving immigrants.

The city was later granted a temporary restraining order forbidding the INS to reopen the center or any other facility in Harlingen “in such a manner as to constitute a nuisance and threat to public health and safety.”

On some nights, scores of Central Americans have slept outside the building to retain places in line for the next morning. Four portable toilets at the side of the building have been allowed to overflow, the lawsuit says, and the parking lot and nearby vacant lots are littered with trash and rotting food.

The INS kept a fire exit at the center locked and had seating for 450 people in a building that, under the fire code, has a maximum occupancy of 196, the suit says.

The INS has not performed any health screening of the asylum refugees for communicable diseases, the lawsuit charged, and local health officials have reported an increase in hepatitis.

INS officials said they have been working to improve the center. The agency has resolved two of the three fire code violations brought to its attention and was reducing the seating capacity, INS attorney David Ayala said.