ICE Says Crowd Abuse Case Footage Vanished in “System Crash” One Day After Lawsuit

Despite the "Big Waste of A Bill" providing 170 BILLION for immigration enforcement and border "protection", the government said "we don't have resources" to retain all footage and that plaintiffs could supply "endless hard drives that we could save things to." Incidentally, ICE and Border Patrol continued to be paid during the government shutdown because hey, wouldn't you rather have paid masked thugs roaming your city than paying air traffic controllers for the critical work they do?

The federal government says that nearly two weeks of surveillance footage (Oct. 20–30) from the ICE-run Broadview Detention Center disappeared in a “system crash” that allegedly occurred the day after detainees filed a lawsuit over abusive conditions. The missing footage is considered crucial evidence because it covers the period immediately preceding the suit, just another continuation of ICE's frequent lawlessness.

At a court hearing, lawyers for the detained immigrants said it is unclear whether the government is making any genuine attempt to recover the deleted footage. Government attorneys claimed they lack the resources to preserve or store continuous video from the facility’s roughly 63 cameras and suggested detainees could provide “endless hard drives” if they want full retention. The government has only provided limited footage from other dates and said a contractor—an obscure LLC called Five by Five Management, apparently based out of a house—was involved when the data was lost. Plaintiffs say no one has supplied system logs or evidence of recovery attempts, raising concerns about intentional deletion.

The judge pushed back on the government’s claims of insufficient resources, noting the federal government has far more capacity than the detainees. Government attorneys maintain the footage is not recoverable yet. If you know anything about storage devices, you know that deleted data can often be recovered with forensic tools available not just to law enforcement. You can bet that if you wipe your phone or hard drive before the police break down your door, your devices will be subject to said tools. In fact, the Trump administration contracted with Israeli-based Paragon Solutions, giving immigration agencies access to sophisticated hacking tools, including encrypted devices.

The underlying lawsuit alleges severe, inhumane conditions at Broadview: extreme overcrowding, people forced to sleep on floors or plastic chairs for days or weeks, inadequate food and water, unsanitary environments, extreme temperatures, and abusive behavior by federal officers.