Women detained in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers are being subjected to sexual assault, a top immigrant-rights advocate testified during a congressional field hearing Friday in San Antonio.

Texas Immigration Law Council Director of Policy and Legal Services Kristen Etter made the accusation during a hearing at the San Antonio Central Library organized by U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro. The Alamo City Democrat organized the gathering to hear testimony on ICE’s plan to open an immigrant detention site on the city’s East Side.

“We actually got a call from a sexual assault nurse examiner last year who had done a rape kit on a woman that had said she was sexually assaulted in an ICE detention facility,” Etter told the panel. “But the local prosecuting authorities would not accept it because they said they did not have jurisdiction over that particular ICE facility that was operated by private contractors.”

READ ON AT SACURRENT