Disability Rights California (DRC) releases a new report, “Otay Mesa Detention Center: Inhumane Conditions and the Harsh Realities of ICE’s Civil Detention System.” 

Based on our findings, DRC investigation confirms the conditions in Otay Mesa violate ICE’s own standards as well as those required by the U.S. Constitution and federal statutes prohibiting disability discrimination. People with disabilities detained there, as well as other people in detention, experience serious psychological and physical harm due to:

• Inadequate mental health treatment;
• An unreliable system for providing accommodations to people with disabilities;
• Excessive and harsh use of isolation and solitary confinement, including unjustified isolation of people based on their medical conditions;
• Punitive treatment that should not be imposed on civil detainees such as those housed at Otay Mesa;
• Inadequate medical care and the denial of needed dental care;
• Discriminatory treatment of people who identify as LGBTQ+; and
• An inadequate response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Read our Press Release