Detainees at Florida’s “Alligator Alcatraz” immigration detention center said this week that guards denied them food and clean water for several days unless they signed documents presented in English that they did not understand, according to an audio recording of a phone call obtained by The Guardian and shared with the advocacy group Workers Circle.
The Guardian reported that during a telephone call on Thursday to Workers Circle representatives, more than half a dozen detainees alleged that the water they had been given over the previous three days was “rotten” and contained mosquito larvae. One detainee said on the call that guards had taken away all water and were refusing to provide it. “They took all the water, and they don’t want to give us water,” the detainee said. A second detainee described the water as “stinky and rotten” and said he saw mosquitoes emerging from it.
The same detainee said guards withheld lunch on Thursday after detainees declined to sign documents written in English. “They’ve taken reprisals with us for not taking that paper, not signing that paper,” he said, adding that guards also withheld medicine to detainees who needed it, including one with diabetes and another with high blood pressure. Chants of “agua, agua” broke out Thursday morning when drinking water was removed entirely, according to the detainees.
Noelle Damico, director of social justice for Workers Circle, an organization that has served as a liaison between detainees and their families, said the pressure had escalated over several days. “They’re being asked by guards to sign documents that they cannot fully see, nor do they understand,” Damico said. “The water in the past three days has been unusually disgusting with mosquito larvae, dirt in it, and tasting absolutely rotten. So that predates today, now they’ve removed the water.”
Damico called the reported food and water deprivation an “outrageous violation of basic human rights under international and national law.”
The Guardian reported that it had contacted the Florida Department of Emergency Management, which oversees the facility’s operation using private guards, for comment. The department previously denied allegations of mistreatment at the center. In a statement on May 29 following an earlier allegation that a diabetic detainee was denied medication, Stephanie Hartman, the department’s director of communications, said: “Medical facilities and staff, including a pharmacy, are available 24/7 to detainees.”
Reports last month indicated that “Alligator Alcatraz” — a tented facility built on a little-used training airport deep in the Florida Everglades — would wind down operations in June, leading to its eventual closure. The facility, operated by the state of Florida as an immigration jail on behalf of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency, has been operating for nearly a year and has drawn widespread criticism over conditions. Previous allegations include denial of access to immigration lawyers, frequent and sudden transfer of detainees, and pressure to accept deportation without legal representation.