The torturous methods allegedly used at Florida’s “Alligator Alcatraz” echo one of the most horrific abuses carried out by the CIA at its secret “black site” prisons after the September 11 attacks.
Guards at the immigration detention center in the Everglades punish detainees by confining them in what inmates call “the box,” a 2×2-foot cage-like structure where their hands and feet are shackled to the ground, and they are unable to sit or move, according to a new report from Amnesty International.
The global human rights organization alleged in a damning 48-page report that the federal Krome North Services Processing Center—and especially Alligator Alcatraz—are subjecting people in detention to punishment and conditions that violate international law.
“Amnesty International considers that detention conditions at both facilities amount to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and in some instances, torture or other ill-treatment,” the report reads. “The use of the ‘box’ at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ constitutes torture.”
Amnesty, which operates in more than 150 countries, interviewed detainees at the ICE-run Krome North Processing Center who had previously been held at Alligator Alcatraz. They all described “the box” similarly: an outdoor, cramped cage where people were held for hours in solitary confinement, exposed to the South Florida sun and mosquitoes with no food or water. Some compared the experience to being a caged animal at a zoo.
“People ended up in the ‘box’ just for asking the guards for anything. I saw a guy who was put in it for an entire day,” one former detainee alleged.
Another said two of his cellmates were dragged to the box by ten guards because he needed his medication, and the men were calling out for help.
“They were taken to the ‘box’ and punished just for trying to help me,” he said. “Any time that anyone demanded that our rights be respected, they were punished.”
The CIA used a similar torture method at its post-9/11 black sites, including on Abu Zubaydah, the longest-held prisoner in the U.S. war on terrorism and the first to be waterboarded by the agency. Zubaydah was held for more than 11 days in a coffin-size confinement box and for 29 hours in a smaller one—still larger than the boxes reportedly used at Alligator Alcatraz—measuring 21 inches wide, 2.5 feet deep, and 2.5 feet high.
Black site detainees were also held naked, forced into stress positions, deprived of sleep and solid food, and physically assaulted—all allegations now being leveled against the Florida immigration center.
“It’s a copy of Guantánamo,” a Cuban man who was detained there for 11 days told Amnesty International. “The conditions are inhuman.”
“Alligator Alcatraz” is the first state-owned and -operated detention center in the United States. A pet project of Gov. Ron DeSantis, allegations of inhumane treatment at the facility—including beatings and gropings—have circulated since its hasty opening on July one.
A spokesperson for the failed presidential candidate rejected Amnesty’s report as “politically motivated.”
“None of these fabrications are true. In fact, running these allegations without any evidence whatsoever could jeopardize the safety and security of our staff and those being housed at Alligator Alcatraz,” Florida Press Secretary Molly Best wrote in a statement to the Daily Beast.
Spokespersons for the White House and the Department of Homeland Security did not respond to requests for comment.
This summer, civil rights lawyers filed a lawsuit over whether detainees are receiving proper access to an attorney—one of three ongoing legal challenges over conditions at the detention center.
In August, a federal judge ordered the facility to shut down due to environmental concerns, ruling that the state violated federal law by constructing the compound—massive tents erected on an abandoned airstrip, with giant cages holding 35 to 38 inmates—without conducting required environmental assessments.
Because the facility is federally funded, it is subject to the National Environmental Policy Act, which mandates environmental reviews before any “major” federal action or construction project. That order, however, was paused in October by an appellate panel.
President Donald Trump has visited and praised the facility, encouraging other states to replicate it as his administration faces a shortage of detention centers amid its immigration crackdown.
But the detention center comes at a steep price. “Alligator Alcatraz” has already secured more than $360 million in state-issued contracts and is projected to require roughly $450 million annually to operate once fully operational, according to the Amnesty report.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, meanwhile, has framed building more centers as a “cost-saving effort,” insisting they are “much less per-bed cost than what some of the previous contracts under the Department of Homeland Security were.”
Noem—who is currently fighting off rumors of being axed from Trump’s cabinet—isn’t exactly known for her fiscal intuition. In November, it was reported that she and Corey Lewandowski, her chief adviser turned alleged lover, ordered ten Spirit Airlines jets before realizing the planes had no engines.
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