This is a statement that you will soon come across if you deal with this area of law (see, among others, Legal Tribune from March 15, 2022 under detention pending deportation: "Normal life minus freedom" (lto.de) or Frankfurter Rundschau from August 31, 2019 under detention pending deportation : “50 percent unlawful detentions” (fr.de)). And the experience of people working in this area, particularly other RLCs, supports this estimate.

People who are legally obliged to leave the country and who the authorities fear could evade deportation are placed in detention pending deportation. These people have not committed any crimes, but are being detained to ensure that their obligation to leave the country is enforced. This detention can last from several months to one and a half years. Unlike in criminal proceedings, these people are not provided with a public defender or other legal assistance. In addition, the responsibility for the arrest decision lies with the local courts, although it is based on administrative law. These and other factors lead to numerous decisions being made with legal errors that are never challenged or otherwise discovered. That is why other RLCs, especially in Bremen and Hamburg, have started to offer legal advice and support specifically for these people. We are now trying to establish these projects in Bavaria.

We therefore started this project together with the RLCs Passau and Nuremberg/Erlangen. Once a month we visit the deportation detention facility in Hof, meet prisoners there and offer them our support. In these cases, we not only offer legal advice, but also take legal action against the decisions ourselves. The aim is to at least somewhat counteract the deficits in the rule of law and possibly even to encourage legal practice to be of better quality.