BATON ROUGE - One of the parties sued by the state of Louisiana over a federal inmate with a rare strain of tuberculosis being allowed into Basile and Monroe's general population issued a response to the suit.

The GEO Group, who operates the Basile Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities, is one of 12 parties included in Louisiana's suit. 

Regarding GEO's role in the complaint, the state of Louisiana alleged that GEO allowed the prisoner to be released into the general population with no airborne isolation, resulting in approximately 174 detainees at the Basile facility being exposed to tuberculosis.

GEO responded to the allegations by saying they admit the allegations, but the release to the general population was based on a medical clearance of a pulmonologist.