New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill said New Jersey’s attorney general would examine reports of civil rights violations by state police outside of an ICE detention center.

New Jersey state police clashed violently with protesters outside the Delaney Hall detention center in Newark over the weekend, resulting in dozens of arrests and harsh public criticism as scores of videos posted to social media showed state troopers wearing riot gear, using tear gas and penning protesters in between lines of officers.

Sherrill was confronted by multiple callers over the response on Wednesday during WNYC’s “Ask Governor Sherrill” call-in show, produced in partnership with WHYY, WBGO and Montclair State University.

Several callers described state police instigating altercations with protesters. Over the last few days, state officials have said most protesters were peaceful, but threw projectiles, set off fireworks and moved aggressively toward officers.

One caller from Pitman said they’d spent days with the crowd protesting outside of Delaney Hall and said they were personally subjected to what they described as excessive use of force by state police.

“I’m sorry that that happened to you, and certainly if there were incidents like that, the attorney general will be looking into that,” Sherrill said. “I’ve certainly wanted to be as open and accountable as possible.”

The governor has faced heavy criticism across the political spectrum in recent days for her handling of the protests.

Delaney Hall is the largest of two privately run ICE detention centers in New Jersey. The facility is a former halfway house that had been shuttered for years, but was reopened last year by the GEO Group, a Florida-based company that has a $1 billion federal contract to operate for 15 years.

Immigrants detained in Delaney Hall have regularly complained of poor conditions inside the facility, including inadequate medical care and low-quality food. Their families and friends have complained that it is difficult to see detainees thanks to an opaque and burdensome visitation process.

The Department of Homeland Security and GEO Group have both repeatedly denied claims that detainees are mistreated.

People have been regularly protesting peacefully outside Delaney Hall since the facility reopened last year. Immigrant rights advocates and Democratic politicians at all levels of government, including Sherrill, have repeatedly called for its closure.

Those messages became more urgent in May, after hundreds of detainees signed a public letter decrying conditions inside and civil rights violations in the immigration system.

But the violent clashes that marred recent days erupted at the start of Memorial Day weekend, after detainees launched a hunger and labor strike inside Delaney Hall.

Activists on Sunday of the holiday weekend said they believed ICE was trying to transfer out one detainee who was associated with the strike as a form of retaliation against him and his wife, who had led a rally of families outside. A chaotic scene took shape in front of Delaney Hall’s gates, as protesters attempted to block vans from leaving the facility.

It set up the first of multiple violent nights between protesters and ICE agents outside of the detention center. Last Friday night, after almost a week of federal agents confronting the crowds, Sherrill arranged for the New Jersey State Police to take over crowd control.

On Saturday, Newark city officials set a curfew for the area around Delaney Hall and restricted access to the road on which the facility is located.

Sherrill said at the time the goal of sending in state troopers was to lower the temperature at the scene, and avoid giving the federal government a pretext for surging ICE into New Jersey. But the plan appeared to backfire, as state police used force on multiple nights to clear crowds.

State police actions were slammed by groups on the left and cheered by Trump administration officials. The uproar peaked after troopers arrested 61 people on Sunday night, protesters who had been gathered at a police checkpoint half a mile from Delaney Hall.

Newark police took command of the situation Monday afternoon and lifted the curfew on Tuesday night. There have been no arrests at the scene since the local police stepped in.

State police handling of the protests dominated headlines over the weekend. But Sherrill had also been criticized by advocates who said she failed to leverage state power to address the conditions inside Delaney Hall or get the facility shut down.

When detainees launched their hunger strike, one of their demands was that Sherrill visit them inside Delaney Hall to see conditions herself. Sherrill did attempt to visit days after the strike began, but she was denied entry. The governor does not have the authority to enter the detention center at her own will; unlike members of Congress, who by law are allowed to make scheduled or unannounced oversight visits.

In the days after Sherrill’s visit attempt, state health officials tried to inspect conditions inside Delaney Hall. The inspectors were denied entry on Wednesday; they were allowed in on Thursday, but only given access to food service areas.

The Sherrill administration has since filed a state lawsuit seeking a court order for a complete health inspection of the detention center. Sherrill said on “Ask Governor Sherrill” that she believed an accounting of conditions inside from state health officials would be important to the public understanding.