Here is an updated and expanded map of official ICE detainees in the Broome County Jail up to October 15, 2025:
This includes persons from Albania, Algeria, Angola, Bangladesh, Belarus, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burma, Cameroon, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Czech Republic, D.R. Congo, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Eritrea, Georgia, Ghana, Guatemala, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Hungary, India, Iran, Israel, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Romania, Russia, Spain, Sri Lanka, St. Lucia, Taiwan, Tajikstan, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkiye, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Venezuela.
We need followups: Who and why was the Ukrainian citizen deported to Russia according to the ICE data? How many persons arrested locally or held on state or Federal charges are later turned into ICE detainees? Why doesn’t the Broome County Jail include on its list of “inmates” on the Sheriff’s app the names of any ICE detainees, some who spend many months in the jail?
Source Note
This map was generated from government data provided by ICE in response to a FOIA request to the Deportation Data Project and analyzed by Justtalk. The dataset on detentions (here) is incomplete. The dataset runs only to October 15, 2025, missing continual flows since then. It excludes lists of persons for whom ICE sent detainers to the Broome Jail with uncertain outcomes. And some people who have been held in the jail under Federal charges aren’t recorded under ICE even if held only on successive deportation charges. So the numbers and countries are assuredly more numerous than this map suggests; Jamaica and Azerbaijan, for example, also likely belong to the list.
ICE is back in the local news: Binghamton and Long Island communities and media are now responding to last week’s revelation that the Broome County Jail is caging a Long Island teenager, Gendri Ortiz Paredes, for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). How does Ortiz end up in Binghamton? Well the Broome County Sheriff, an ardent Trump supporter, has a formal agreement to house ICE and Federal detainees, signed and paid for without consulting County legislators. So Gendri was transported from Long Island to overnight in an ICE Manhattan center and then onward to the Broome jail where he has been for over four weeks.
Local newspapers in Binghamton and Long Island are picking up the story. Gendri is uncertain about what is going on, anxious, puzzled, and visibly shaken. Not a single staff person can speak his language. His school superintendent wants him back in school.
His mother is distraught. His soccer teammates miss him (he is a midfielder, wearing number 17). His teachers speak admirably of his work and want him back in school. His English teacher simply states “To be honest with you, he’s a great student…very respectful, honest, hardworking,” someone who “got along great with everybody, even with the other teachers, too …. I consider him a friend.”
In one sense he is not alone: he is just one of scores of persons captured from around the state and then bundled in and out of the Broome jail for days, weeks, months. Like others he was kept incommunicado, in this case in solitary, for the first two weeks. How many more are there? What are conditions inside? ICE doesn’t easily reveal who these people are, where they are captured, or where and how long they are in our jail. The Sheriff doesn’t provide any details either. Their names and numbers are not listed on the Sheriff’s app’s inmate roster. Local and regional farm workers and roofers are often only discovered when persons visit the jail. Jailing Ortiz is of course part of wider drive to capture and hide ICE detainees of all ages.
Where are your family from?
Hidden away, its easy to pretend this a distant problem. Most people presume ICE detainees are from faraway Mexico or central America. Don’t believe it. It’s a much wider sweep ranging across Africa, the Caribbeean, Europe and Latin America. Here are a few of the locations represented by people held for ICE in the county jail (list below). Where are your family from?
N.Y Lawmakers discussing calls to change Raise the Age Law
While Gendri and other teens and kids fester in ICE detention centers, an organized campaign is growing to expand the number of all teens, citizens or not, tried in adult courts and held in adult jails. It’s worrisome: there is a long history of abuse of youth in the Broome jail. The County lost successive lawsuits over the beating of Black teen (see here) and the tear gassing and housing of a naked youth (see here). The County no longer houses people under 18. The Sheriff along with others—including District Attorneys around the state and NYPD Chief Tisch under NYC Mayor Adams and soon to be mayor Zohran Mamdani—would like to change this by rolling back the “raise the age” law, bringing teens less than 18 back into adult courts and presumably the jail. This battle is accelerating into the new legislative year.
Note
*Albania, Angola, Bangaladesh, Brazil, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Czech Republic, D.R. Congo, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ghana, Guatemala, Guinea, Haiti, Honduras, Hungary, India, Iran, Israel, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Romania, Russia, Spain, St. Lucia, Taiwan, Tajikstan, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkiye, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Venezuela.
This map was generated from government data provided by ICE in response to a FOIA request to the Deportation Data Project and analyzed by Justtalk. The dataset on detentions (here) is incomplete. The dataset runs only to September this year, missing continual flows since then. It excludes lists of persons who had detainers requested by ICE. And some people who are held in the jail aren’t recorded under ICE but under other Federal charges (even if held only on deportation charges). So the numbers and countries are assuredly more numerous than this map suggests; Jamaica and Eritrea for example also likely belong to the list.
This week Newsday reports from Long Island that another Roosevelt High School teen has been captured by ICE. This time the teen was sent not to a Texas ICE detention center but to the Broome County Jail. He has actually been there for over two weeks now, far from his mom and school (he is a midfielder, #17, on the men’s soccer team). He sits alone, anxious, and in shock. He does not know what will happen to him.
Why is Broome County Jail caging Long Island teenagers for ICE? Is it because the Broome Sheriff and Nassau County Police Department have both signed 287g agreements with ICE? Or is because Broome is the official ICE detention center on the route from NYC to the over-capacity Buffalo ICE detention center?
It isn’t because he makes $ for the Sheriff: indeed by the Sheriff’s own admission it costs $274 to keep someone for one day (his estimate during the state correctional officers’ illegal strike that he supported). And yet the Federal Goverment only reimburses $110/day. And there are scores of Federal detainees held every day, some for months and months. How many ICE detainees are there, how long are they incarcerated here? We don’t know. But clearly $ millions are being spent to maintain for years a supersized jail.
In the face of three successive protests and much testimony in the Broome County Legislative chamber against ICE detention, 12 of 15 county legislators voted recentlly to endorse the Sheriff’s budget with $ for ICE. Did they really want out-of-town teens incarcerated at their, our expense?
On Sept. 16, images of people being taken into custody in Johnson City began circulating on social media. ICE has not returned a request for comment on any recent operations in the Binghamton area.
Following an outcry from residents, City of Binghamton Mayor Jared Kraham said any ICE operations in the area are taking place without the Binghamton Police Department’s involvement or “even their prior notification.”
“I continue to be concerned by ICE raids and operations under the Trump administration, which have included the use of unidentified masked personnel and raise serious questions around constitutional policing, due process and accountability,” Kraham said in a statement. “As Mayor, I believe Binghamton’s police resources should be focused on neighborhood safety and crime, not civil immigration enforcement, and certainly not performative or incendiary law enforcement activity that erodes trust in our communities.”
The Broome County Sheriff’s Office declined to comment on the situation and referred a request for comment to ICE.
New York State Sen. Lea Webb and Assemblywoman Donna Lupardo posted a joint statement on Facebook accusing ICE of “making arrests through profiling rather than by judicial warrant.”
Webb and Lupardo said they are in contact with other government officials and are working to “protect the community against ICE’s unwelcome presence.”
“Many of those being targeted have come to our country to provide a better life for their families and are doing jobs few people are interested in,” the statement said. “They deserve a pathway to citizenship rather than the unjust, inhumane treatment we are seeing with these raids.”
Concerned Residents of Greater Binghamton Coordinator Adam Flint said he and others within the organization started hearing reports of ICE arrests early on Sept. 16.
“What we believe is going on is racial profiling,” Flint said. “We believe ICE is out there on the streets looking for people that fit a profile that might allow them to meet their quota.”
BINGHAMTON, N.Y. (WBNG) — On Thursday evening, a panel comprised of attorneys, the CEO and President of the American Civic Association and other experts against the presence of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the Southern Tier spoke at Binghamton United Presbyterian Church about Broome County’s collaboration with the federal department.
Over 150 people from across Broome County gathered at the church to listen to panel speakers and voice their concerns over the collaboration.
Organizer of the event and Coordinator of Concerned Residents Greater Binghamton, Adam Flint, told 12 News, he believes the County’s participation in the 287(g) program is a misuse of tax dollars and harbors fear within the community.
“We should not have our tax dollars and our facilities used for this. It makes people scared of going to authorities, it creates legal liabilities, it’s the wrong thing to do,” said Flint.
Jail Visitation Project Coordinator for Justice and Unity in the Southern Tier Luna Azcurrain alleges, Broome County is only reimbursed for 50% of the costs of collusion, meaning that local taxpayers are picking up the rest of the tab.
“Not only are we paying to help detain these folks, we are also now paying to have more staff because now the jail has more population. So, it becomes actually very costly to run this agreement,” said Azcurrain.
However, the Broome County Sheriff’s Office FAQ document regarding the 2879(g) program states, “detainees ($110.00 per detainee per day), whether they be U.S. Marshals, FBI or ICE, are all directed to the Broome County general fund and serve to offset costs, not increase costs to taxpayers”.
In a statement to 12 News, the Broome County Sheriff’s Office said, “This same group of activists continues attempting to spread lies and misinformation about the Broome County Sheriff’s Office’s relationship to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Despite these repeated falsehoods, our BCSO team has been crystal clear with our community from the start. The BCSO’s specific participation in the 287(g) program has zero impact on immigration enforcement in Broome County or any other community”.
What does Broome County spend to support Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)? It’s hard to know, for the figures of the number of daily ICE detainees in the County jail and their food, housing, medical care, and transport costs remain hidden, largely folded into the total number of persons caged on Federal–and not county–charges.
It’s a longstanding practice: since at least 2002 when a contract was signed with the U.S. Marshalls service, Broome County has held Federal detainees. The number used to be 20 or so persons a day. Since Trump took office and the County Sheriff signed an additional cooperative contract with ICE, the number of Federal detainees has ballooned to now 60 or more a day. On some days busloaeds of persons are brought into the jail by ICE in shackles, required ever more food, medical and correctional staff overtime, laundy, etc.
It’s a wonderful deal for Federal agencies like ICE: Federal reimbursements are only $110/day per person, less half the cost the County government pays. The average daily cost of incarcerating someone in the jail in 2024 was $278 (Broome Jail budget of $33 million divided by avearge daily population of 395). The average daily number of persons caged in the first seven months of 2025 rose to 405, lowering the daily cost to $230–still more than double the Federal payment.
Do the math and Broome County is gifting the Federal government over $1 million so far this year.
Perhaps it is time for county legislators to stop voting as they have for years on the food, housing and other jail contracts that hide these subsidies—and cancel the contract with the U.S. Marshalls service has turned the County jail into a detention center for ICE and other Federal agencies.
Yes, the Broome County Jail is an official Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facility. And who is being held there for ICE? We don’t know for sure, but it has included people from Azerbaijan to China, from Ecuador to Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey and Venezuela–among others.
The Sheriff repeatedly tells us that the 287g agreement he recently signed with ICE is only to allow his ICE-trained deputies to serve warrants in the jail. All quite accurate. But thats a diversion. The jail has held scores of persons for ICE this year, presumably under the contract with the U.S. Marshalls Service that has for decades included caging ICE detainees—often seized in the past through raids conducted by ICE alongside joint task forces of the Sheriff, Johnson, and Binghamton police departments (see for example Press and Sun Bulletin January 2011, p.3).
Who is being detained now? We don’t know. What does ICE say? As little as possible.
As reported here previously, the Deportation Data Project among others has been collating information from ICE through multiple Freedom of Information Requests. Their data sets located here reveal that the Broome County Jail is listed on ICE datasets as an ICE “Detention Facility”. The datasets are small and list few persons among the scores or hundreds held in the Broome County Jail at one time or another in recent months. But look at this clip from just one ICE data set, and you can see the Broome County Jail holding ICE detainees, predominantly Black and Brown people, from Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and the Americas.
The dataset is seriously incomplete. Other datasets on the site which cover ICE detention to detainer to arrests operations have persons from Iran to Russia and Mexico in the Broome County Jail. No one knows what a full accounting might reveal.
These persons are held without due process or legal representation which led a Broome County Legislator to resign from the jail’s advisory group. Our elected officials have nvertheless signed off on all the jail funding with few if any questions–for years.
Can our County Legislators make few inquiries on what is being done in their name, and report back to us on what is going on?
And if any county legislators want to stop acting for ICE (and save the County lots of money), they should act to cancel the contracts that allows the jail to be at the beck and call of Federal authorities and pass the additional costs of housing hundreds of persons.
The next stop? The City of Binghamton and local police departments.
They should stop reporting to ICE, through the surveillance center housed in the Binghamton Police Department, the status of persons spotted on our streets by local surveillance devices and those stopped, interrogated and held on local charges.
Will city and council members and our mayors keep ICE out of our community, our data, our literal biometric faces?
