HUNGER STRIKING DETAINEE SUES TO PREVENT FORCE FEEDING

Arnel Belizaire, a 29-year-old Haitian asylum seeker who is in detention pending the outcome of his asylum application, has been on a hunger strike for the past two months.  Recently a federal judge issued an order authorizing the INS to force feed him should his life be at risk.  Belizaire has, with the assistance of the American Civil Liberties Union, challenged this order, claiming his hunger strike is a protest against his continued detention and is therefore political speech protected by the First Amendment. 

Belizaire was arrested in 1998 for entering the US without authorization, an offense for which he served six months.  Since being released from prison he has been held in Krome Detention Center in Miami pending payment of ,000 bond.  He began the hunger strike in protest of his detention, arguing that he cannot prove his claim to political asylum unless he is free to gather evidence to support it.  Over the course of his hunger strike, his weight has dropped from 200 pounds to 135 pounds. 

At a hearing this week, attorneys for the INS said the agency has to be able to feed him for two reasons.  First, they said the agency has a moral obligation to keep him alive.  Second, they said that if Belizaire starves himself to death it would lead other detainees at Krome to follow suit, which would in turn cause discipline problems.  Belizaire’s attorneys countered that his hunger strike is a political protest that the government cannot stop with the use of force, and the fact that he could die as a result of his protest does not alter that.  The judge has postponed a ruling until he is able to speak with Belizaire and the director of Krome, neither of whom were at this week’s hearing.