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HOUSTON – The Trump administration is trying to deport several women who claim to have been abused by a Georgian gynecologist at a migrant detention center, their lawyers say.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Services have already deported six former patients who complained about Dr Mahendra Amin, accused of operating on migrant women without their consent or of performing medically unnecessary and potentially endangering procedures. ability to have children. At least seven other people at the Irwin County Detention Center in Ocilla, Ga. Who had made allegations against the doctor have learned that they may soon be deported from the country, lawyers said.
Hours after a female detainee spoke to federal investigators, she said ICE told her that lifted the stay on her deportation and that she risked an “imminent” removal.
Another woman was taken to a rural Georgia airport early Monday and asked to sign deportation papers, only to be returned to the facility as her lawyers sued in federal court.
They allege that Amin performed operations that caused or worsened their pain without explaining what he was doing or giving them an alternative. Their stories fit a larger pattern of allegations made by inmates against Amin, some of which came to light in lawyer interviews and medical records reviewed by the Associated Press.
The Ministry of Justice has opened a criminal investigation and the Inspector General of the Ministry of Homeland Security is also investigating.
Amin’s attorney, Scott Grubman, has previously denied the doctor did anything wrong and called him “a well-respected doctor who has dedicated his adult life to treating a high-risk, underserved population. in rural Georgia ”. Amin stopped seeing women at the Irwin County Detention Center.
Immigrant advocates have urged federal investigators to examine not only the doctor, but also the detention center and any role that ICE has played in sending patients to it.
While people who have been deported may still be able to serve as witnesses in a criminal or civil case, many find themselves in unstable countries or situations where it becomes difficult to keep in touch with them. The deportations take place in the final weeks of President Donald Trump’s administration following his loss to Democrat Joe Biden.
“ICE is destroying the evidence necessary for this investigation,” said Elora Mukherjee, a law professor at Columbia University who works with several of these women.
ICE said it had informed the Inspector General of Homeland Security “of any planned transfer or removal of inmates from Irwin who were former patients of Dr Amin.”
“Any implication that the ICE tries to obstruct the investigation by making referrals of interviewees is completely false,” the agency said in a statement.
The Justice Department declined to comment. Grubman declined to say whether the doctor had spoken to investigators.
Mbeti Ndonga, 37, was taken to Amin last year after seeking treatment for abdominal pain and excessive vaginal bleeding. She said she wanted a new prescription to continue treatment ordered by a former doctor. Instead, she said, Amin insisted she had a procedure known as dilation and curettage, in which tissue is removed from the uterus to treat the excessive bleeding. Her medical records show that she also underwent a laparoscopy, in which incisions are made in the abdomen.
“He was adamant and said I had to have surgery,” Ndonga told AP.
When she woke up she said Amin told her she could never have children. We do not know if this is the case. She still suffers from bleeding and pain.
Ndonga spoke to government investigators twice, most recently on Tuesday. “I told them that I had been mistreated, tortured, dehumanized,” she said.
Hours after her first interview last week, Ndonga and her lawyers say she was told that the ICE lifted the stay on her deportation and that she can be sent to Kenya at any time.
“Mbeti’s fear in answering investigators’ questions was that it would worsen his immigration case,” Mukherjee said. “And within hours of the interview, his worst fears came true.”
Another woman was taken to see Amin in February after asking for estrogen patches to treat hot flashes, following a hysterectomy performed by another doctor in 2014. She asked to be identified only by her first name. , Yanira, because she fears she will be targeted by criminals if she is deported. in Mexico.
Yanira said Amin told her he would do a vaginal ultrasound and that she would need a Pap smear, a cancer screening test in which a doctor takes cells from the cervix of a woman. woman.
Both procedures caused her severe pain. After the Pap test, Yanira said she noticed there was no lubrication on the tools Amin used. She struggled to sit still for almost a week.
“We are humans. We are women. We have feelings, ”she said. “Just because we are detained doesn’t mean we should be treated like animals.”
ICE did not respond to questions about the two women, who were brought to the United States as young children. Ndonga had previously been deported after being arrested for interfering with government property and then apprehended by ICE after returning to the country, Mukherjee said.
Yanira entered custody after being arrested for possession of less than a gram of cocaine or methamphetamine, according to the criminal record. Her lawyers informed the government on Thursday that she wanted to speak to Amin investigators. Early Monday, Yanira says she was taken to an airport to board an eviction flight. But another ICE agent approached to say she would not be deported because her lawyers intervened.
Grubman declined to comment, citing federal privacy law.
ICE policy calls on officers to “exercise all appropriate discretion on a case-by-case basis” regarding the deportation of “victims of crime, witnesses of crime and persons who make legitimate civil rights complaints. “.
The agency said this week it was “accommodating interviews” conducted by government investigators. He added that once a detained migrant has exhausted all remedies, “he remains subject to a final deportation decision … and this decision must be enforced.”
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