The T. Don Hutto Residential Center is an immigration detention facility located in Taylor, Texas.  It is located approximately 40 miles from Austin, Texas.  The facility, which opened in 2006, was dedicated to housing only immigrant women and children.  Because Hutto is restricted to detaining vulnerable groups, it has come under heightened scrutiny for its failures to meet ICE’s detention standards.  Most of the women currently detained at Hutto were arrested after recently crossing the border to seek asylum in the United States.

Contact Information

Contacting the Facility

Address:

Don Hutto Residential Center
1001 Welch Street
Taylor, Texas 76574

Phone:

(512)218-2400 (press 0 to speak to an operator)

Contacting A Detainee

To speak to a detainee by phone,  call the facility’s main desk at (512)218-2400 and leave a message for the inmate to call you back.  The facility operator will not connect you directly to a detainee.  In your message, include a time for the person to call you back to ensure availability.  Inmates at Hutto are not allowed free phone calls.  They need money to purchases calling card.

To deposit money in the person’s account, send a money order to the facility.  The money order should be issued by a bank or post office, and should be written to the person.  (Include her full name and alien number.)  After the money is deposited in the person’s commissary account, she will be able to purchase clothes, snacks, and calling cards.

To visit the a person held at the Hutto detention facility, go to the 1001 Welch Street, Taylor, Texas between 8am and 8pm.  The facility is now open for visitation every day of the week.

To send mail to the person, use the following address:

Inmate Name and Alien Number
P.O. Box 1063
Taylor, Texas 76574

Contacting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)

To contact ICE deportation officers or their supervisors, call (512)218-3100 (Press 1 for English, and 2 for Spanish.)

• Ext. 5 for bond
• Ext. 6 for deportation officer
• Ext. 7 for administrat
• Ext. 8 for detention

The Assistant Field Office Director at the Hutto Residential Center is Carl Stephens. His supervisor is Michael Pitts, the Field Office Director of the regional field office in San Antonio.  To contact the San Antonio field office, call (210)283-4750.  Mr. Pitts’s assistant, Melissa L0pez, can be reached at (210)283-4712.

Getting Released

Immigration Bonds

Many of the female detainees at the Hutto facility are eligible for release on bond.  Often ICE is willing to release a person on bond, even before she sees an immigration judge.  To find out if ICE has determined that a person is eligible for bond, call the Hutto ICE sub-office at (512)218-3100 (ext. 6) to speak to the deportation officer assigned to the case.  Even if ICE is unwilling to release a person on bond, she may nonetheless request a bond hearing before an immigration judge.

A detainee’s family or friends can post bond at any ICE ERO Field Office in the United States. However, persons are released fastest when bond is posted at the San Antonio ERO Field Office.

8940 Fourwinds Drive
San Antonio, Texas 78239

To contact the Bond Unit there, call (210)967-7012.  To contact the bond unit at the ICE’s Hutto Sub-Office, call (512)218-3100 (ext. 5).

Post-Release

Inmates released from Hutto are dropped off at the Austin-Bergstrom Airport, located at:

3600 Presidential Boulevard
Austin, TX 78719

The Removal Process

Immigration detainees at Hutto are  generally charged with removability from the United States.  In other words, ICE will try to make the case that the detainee is not legally entitled to live in the United states.  In normal circumstances, Hutto detainees will have a chance to defend themselves in removal proceedings.

Immigration Court

For Hutto detainees, removal proceedings are conducted at the San Antonio Immigration Court.  Detainees at Hutto appear in San Antonio via teleconference.  (During hearings, the detainees sit together in a room at the Hutto Detention Center.)

The judges who conduct removal hearings for detainees at Hutto are:

• Judge Anibal Martinez
• Judge Bertha A. Zuniga

To send mail to the San Antonio Immigration Court, use the following address:

800 Dolorosa Street
San Antonio, Texas 78207

Timeframe

It can often take up to a month for detainees at Hutto to see an immigration judge.  (So long as the immigrant detainee receives a “Notice to Appear,” she can rest assured that she will eventually see a judge.)  Once a Hutto detainee sees an immigration judge, it takes an average of 40 days for her to case to be completed.

Facility Background

The T. Don Hutto Residential Center is owned and operated by Corrections Corporation of America.  It opened in May of 2006, and houses approximately 300 detainees.  In the past, the facility used to hold females and children.  Now the facility does not house juveniles.  Hutto has been at the center of enormous controversy.  In 2007, the ACLU filed a lawsuit against Hutto for failing to meet ICE detention standards.  ICE eventually settled the case.  That same year, a CCA employee was fired for sexual abuse.  In August of 2010, another employee was arrested by the Austin Police Department for groping Hutto detainees.  He was charged with several counts of official oppression and unlawful restraint.

Nearby Facilities

If you are having difficulty locating someone at the Don Hutto Residential Center, you may want to try contacting any the following immigration detention centers:

• Laredo Detention Center (i.e., CCA Laredo)
• Port Isabel Detention Center (i.e., Los Fresnos Detention Center)
• Willacy Detention Center (i.e., Willacy Detention)
• Houston Immigration Detention Center (i.e., Houston Processing Center)
• Dallas Immigration Detention Center
• Rolling Plains Detention Center (i.e., Rolling Plains Correctional Facility)
• Johnson County Detention Center (i.e., Cleburne Texas Jail)
• South Texas Detention Center (Pearsall Immigration Detention Center)