Mukta Joshi is an investigative reporter at Mississippi Today. She is spending a year as a New York Times Local Investigations fellow examining immigration and criminal justice issues. She can be reached at [email protected].
Amid a national surge in arrests by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, one of the largest ICE facilities in the country has become so crowded that people have been sleeping on makeshift beds on the floor, according to detainees there.
Several detainees said that officials at the facility, the Adams County Correctional Center in Natchez recently began placing three people in cells designed for two. Each cell is roughly 8 by 10 feet and contains the beds, plus a toilet, a sink, and shelves and containers for storage, according to detainees.
Andrei Zykov, who came to the United States from Russia, expressed frustration at the crowding in his cell.
“The confinement of a person in one cell is terrible, complete discomfort, little space, nothing to breathe, unsanitary conditions, possible conflicts, restless sleep,” he said.
Zykov is one of several detainees who filed complaints to staff on their facility-issued tablets. He wrote that his cell smelled and was too small for three people, that the air-conditioner didn’t work and the toilet would not properly flush.
“This is a violation of human rights,” he wrote. “Please be understanding.”
A response sent to Zykov shows that the staff ruled his complaint unfounded, stating “the matter is temporary in nature and respectfully request your patience during this period.”
Zykov and others began collecting signatures for a complaint letter they submitted to the facility’s warden. Nearly 70 detainees signed it, according to a copy reviewed by Mississippi Today.
“Because of the limited space,” the letter says, “the third detainee must sleep with his head very close to the toilet, exposing him to unsanitary conditions, unpleasant odors, and an increased risk to his health and dignity.”
An excerpt from the handwritten complaint nearly 70 Adams County detainees signed and submitted to the warden.
An excerpt from the handwritten complaint nearly 70 Adams County detainees signed and submitted to the warden.Although the number of people being held at Adams has varied over time, it has for years been one of the largest ICE facilities in the nation.
Its population was about 1,878 in early July, according to numbers published by ICE. Detainees estimated that at least a few hundred more had been added in recent weeks, based on the number of meals detainees have been asked to help prepare. The facility capacity is 2,232, according to the website of CoreCivic, the prison company that runs the Natchez facility.
Nationally, the number of people booked into detention by ICE in June hit a high, according to Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a data research center based in Syracuse University whose dataset begins in October 2018.
In Natchez, one detainee, Melvin Funez, said 18 people were sleeping on makeshift cots and mattresses on the floor last week in his unit, one of many at the facility. Funez gets paid to help deliver commissary items to fellow detainees. During his rounds, he said he saw at least seven extra mattresses in each unit. Most of them were in “boats,” the bathtub-shaped plastic platforms that hold the mattresses, though some were directly on the floor, Funez said.
On Wednesday, Zykov said 15 detainees were in boats in his unit alone.
Ryan Gustin, a spokesman for CoreCivic, said every detainee was provided with a bed. He did not respond to additional questions about the facility’s headcount or sleeping arrangements.
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