Inmate Describes ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ as ‘A Type of Torture’

CNN heard from eight detainees at Trump’s “Aligator Alcatraz” in the Florida Everglades on Friday’s edition of Erin Burnett OutFront, with one describing the immigration detention center to CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez as “a type of torture.”

“I no longer know when it’s daytime or when it’s nighttime,” said one detainee, Juan Palma Martinez, who came to the U.S. in 2002 and is detained by ICE during a meeting with his probation officer. “It’s a type of torture.”

“They follow you when you’re walking to the shower with your hands on your head. There are more mosquitoes than water,” he added.

“It’s 32 people per cell, or per cage, really. It’s a metal cage,” said another detainee, Gonzalo Almanza Valdes, who has been in the U.S. since 2000 and was similarly detained after showing up to a meeting with his probation officer.

Valdes additionally told CNN that the “24 LED lights in the roof” were kept on all day and night. He described the food as “terrible” with “very, very small” portions: “People are having a hard time living here because they’re starving.”

“Nobody has been able to see a lawyer here,” he said through tears.

Roger Moreno, who came to the U.S. in 1994 and has only traffic violations on his criminal record, said the toilets inside the facility “overflow with sewage” when it rains. He also described instances with no air conditioning and mosquitoes coming “from all sides.”

Erin Burnett continued to report that Democratic and Republican lawmakers recently toured the facility, notably while not allowed to interact with the detainees. Subsequently, then-state Senator Blaise Ingoglia alleged it was in “good condition.”

Watch above via CNN.