WASHINGTON — Six years after he was released from a California immigrant detention facility, Wilfredo Gonzalez Mena has to sleep with his back propped up by pillows, nearly in a seated position, to avoid gasping for air. He blames his lasting medical issues on the 10 months he spent in custody until September 2020 at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center, about 60 miles northeast of Los Angeles, during which guards sprayed him and fellow detainees nearly around the clock with a concentrated disinfectant meant to guard against COVID-19. Now Gonzalez Mena, who is one of six named plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit filed in 2023 over the use of the cleaning solution, is expected to get a six-figure payout as part of a proposed settlement in the case, which was given preliminary approval on Sept. 25 by a federal judge in Riverside.
The settlement applies to around 2,700 people detained at the Adelanto facility between March 11 and Sept. 30, 2020, who were exposed to the disinfectant called HDQ Neutral. The company has also pushed back against California laws seeking to increase oversight of its facilities and inform the public about health and safety shortcomings. Under the settlement, GEO Group and Spartan Chemical Co.
Inc., the company that manufactures HDQ Neutral, acknowledged that HDQ Neutral — which is classified as a pesticide — can cause symptoms including blistering, chemical burns, vomiting, permanent eye damage, and damage to the respiratory tract, throat and stomach. Those findings can now be used by class members who weren’t named plaintiffs and may pursue their own lawsuits, the settlement says. Neither GEO Group nor the Department of Homeland Security responded to requests for comment.
After the lawsuit was filed, GEO Group denied its allegations and said cleaning products are used safely and securely, in accordance with the manufacturer’s guidelines and sanitation standards, at all detention centers. At the time, a GEO Group spokesperson called the allegations “part of a radical politically motivated campaign to attack ICE contractors, abolish ICE and end federal immigration detention.” The company later swapped HDQ Neutral for a different cleaning product. Lawyers from the Los Angeles-based civil rights nonprofit Trial Impact Project who are representing the former detainees called the settlement a victory.
Executive Director Sara Haji referenced other pending lawsuits addressing allegations such as medical neglect, retaliation and substandard food and water. Each one is a different lens into the same problem, she said. The lawsuit alleged that GEO Group engaged in a “months-long poisoning” of detainees when its employees sprayed HDQ Neutral inside the facility.
Before the pandemic, staffers had used it as a cleaning product. But as COVID-19 spread, they began spraying the concentrated solution across wide areas, “directly into the air and on all types of surfaces,” the lawsuit said. Detained immigrants quickly began experiencing the effects, the lawsuit claimed, including nosebleeds, headaches and dizziness.
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