Legal defenders and relatives of prisoners of immigrants held in the notorious Florida Alligator Alcatraz require the closure of the establishment managed by the State, as allegations of human rights violations and in other immigration detention centers.
The detainees of the Alligator Alcatraz, a new installation in the Everglades, described what they called tortuous conditions in cage units full of mosquitoes, where fluorescent lights shine on them at any time. The detainees here also draw attention to unsanitary conditions, as well as the lack of food and reliable medical treatment for their chronic conditions.
“The conditions of detention are unlivable,” said Tessa Petit, executive director of Florida Immigrant Coalition, during A press conference Tuesday Apart from the installation.
Pressure from the Trump administration to quickly accelerate immigration arrests led Overcrowding in immigration and customs facilities. As of June 20, more than 56,000 people spent the night in detention centers nationwide one day given. It is 40% more than in June 2024 and the upper Population of detention in the United States history,, According to a human rights surveillance report. Almost 72% of detained people have no criminal history.
Concerns about the conditions of detention intensified this week after The HRW reportPosted on Monday, documented “abusive practices” in three immigration detention centers in Florida in the past six months. In addition, the New York Immigration Coalition published video showing dozens of men lying on aluminum paper leaves on the ground of a transformation center on crowded immigration in New York.
NBC News recently reported similar allegations Coming from immigration defenders and detainees organized in detention centers across California, Texas, Louisiana, Washington and New Jersey. They described to feel hunger, food shortages and disease.
‘It’s like a dog cage’
During Tuesday’s press conference Sonia Vichara held her mobile phone to a microphone so that her husband, Rafael Collado, can publicly describe from Alligator Alcatraz the conditions he has endured in the past two weeks.
“It’s like a dog cage,” said Collodo, who is Cuban, in his native Spanish. He said that a combination of Flood waters of recent stormsLimited access to showers and poor sanitation led him to obtain mushrooms on his feet.
While describing how the detainees are undressed each time they are moved to another cell and there is no calendar defined to take his medication against hypertension, Collado was informed by a goalkeeper to hang up, he said, putting an end to the call.
Vichara said her husband was showing off immigration appointments for years until he recently held for a Routine recording in an ice field office in Miramar.
Another detainee, Juan Palma, also spoke to NBC Miami From the interior of the Alligator Alcatraz on Monday.
“I have the impression that my life is in danger,” said Palma, who is Cuban in Spanish. He described to feel “in a state of torture”, being grouped by mosquitoes during his sleep and unable to say it of the night since the day because the fluorescent lights of the establishment are always lit.
Palma also said they are allowed to take a shower every three to four days and be kept in a Cage style unit With 32 other people.
The wife of Vichara and Palma, Yanet Lopez, said that their respective husbands had judicial lockers, but they had their time. NBC Miami reported This Palma file included the big flight, credit counterfeiting and battery. Vichara did not provide details on the collaborating file limiting himself to say: “He made a mistake, but he paid for it for 10 years.”
This is not an excuse to put the prisoners in danger, said Petit.
“We are talking about exposing people to diseases and even their death. It is a violation of human rights, it doesn’t matter if you are an immigrant, “she said.
The assistant secretary of internal security, Tricia McLaughlin, denied all the allegations of inhuman conditions at the Alligator Alcatraz and in the immigration detention centers across the country, saying to NBC news in an email on Tuesday: “All prisoners receive appropriate meals, medical treatments, and have opportunities to communicate with their members of their family and Lawyers.
McLaughlin also said that ice “had diligently worked to obtain a larger space of detention necessary while avoiding overcrowding”, adding that the secretary of internal security, Kristi Noem, “called states and the local government to help the capacity of beds and spaces of detention.”
Concerns increase as the population of prisoners increases
Janeisy Fernández Díaz, Michael Borgo Fernández’s mother, a Cuban national held in Alligator Alcatraz, called Tuesday for the closure of the installation.
“I want this place to close,” she said on behalf of her son, who is one of the complainants of a trial Posed last week by the American civil liberties Union against the Ministry of Internal Security.
In the complaint, four people detained in Alligator Alcatraz and their lawyers allege that the federal government has interfered with their ability to access prisoners and provide them with advice, as well as “difficult and inhuman conditions” of the establishment.
Borrego Fernández reported that people detained in Alligator Alcatraz “are only allowed one meal per day (and are not allowed to eat), are not allowed to daily showers and are otherwise maintained 24 hours a day in a cage inside a tent,” said the complaint. He also reported cases of physical assault and excessive use of force by the guards, as well as a lack of medical care and attention.
According to Thomas Kennedy, spokesperson for Florida Immigrant Coalition, Borgo Fernández spent more than 17 days in the establishment, raising questions about the establishment’s operating standards.
Alligator Alcatraz is not a traditional detention center Because it is exploited and funded by the state of Florida to apply federal immigration laws.
NBC News has a request for information pending from Florida officials, requesting a list of detainees and a copy of the Standards describing the rules of detention to the establishment.
During Tuesday’s press conference, immigration defenders made a duty to reject the name of Alligator Alcatraz, who started as a political nickname invented and adopted by republican leaders and is now the official name of the establishment.
It is not the only immigration establishment in Florida faced with allegations.
Based on the interviews with 11 current and former detainees at the Krome North Service Processing Center, the Broward Transitional Center and the Federal Detention Center between January and June, as well as data analysis and conversations with 14 immigration lawyers, Human Rights Watch concluded in his report on the fact that the people of these installations were subjected to dangerous medical and psychosocal care.
The report also noted that the prisoners were forced to sleep on cold and concrete floors without bedding and received “lower quality” food.
