Dogs used to intimidate prisoners. Troubling accounts of inadequate health care, medical emergencies ignored, even unexplained deaths. Immigrants held, sometimes without access to lawyers.

This was the story NPR's Daniel Zwerdling uncovered in the spring of 2004. But this shocking prison story wasn't from Abu Ghraib in Iraq or even Gitmo, it was from prisons right here at home. For more than ten years, U.S. law has stated that non-citizens – both legal and illegal – with criminal records must face deportation, even if they've already served time for their crime. While waiting for deportation, they are held in detention centers inside the U.S. Using sources "on the inside," Zwerdling revealed cases in which detainees in such centers were being abused by prison guards, attacked by dogs, and even dying while awaiting deportation. (Updated Program)


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