Tag Archives: Stephanie Hartman

Newsweek: Florida denies uprising at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’

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The operator of immigration detention facility “Alligator Alcatraz” has denied reports of an uprising at the site.

Stephanie Hartman, spokesperson for Florida Division of Emergency Management (FDEM), which runs the facility for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), told the Guardian: “These reports are manufactured. There is no uprising happening at Alligator Alcatraz. Detainees are given clean, safe living conditions and guards are properly trained on all state and federal protocols.”

Newsweek has contacted the FDEM for comment via email.

Why It Matters

The reports emerged amid ongoing protests outside the facility, where demonstrators have maintained a near-constant presence over concerns about detainee treatment and living conditions. Protesters argue that conditions at the facility are harsh and have called for increased oversight.

What To Know

According to at least three detainees who spoke with Miami’s Spanish-language news channel Noticias 23, guards at Florida’s ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ immigration facility reportedly used tear gas and physical force during a disturbance.

The outlet also reported that a fire alarm was sounding continuously and that a helicopter was circling overhead. The incident occurred as authorities worked to vacate the remote Everglades facility in compliance with a federal judge’s order to close the camp.

A federal judge in Miami last week ordered the facility to close within 60 days for violating environmental laws. The ruling cited improper waste disposal and construction that had affected protected wetlands near the site. On Wednesday, the same judge refused a motion by attorneys representing the state of Florida and the Trump administration to stay her order, meaning the closure timeline remains in effect.

The state of Florida is committed to $245 million toward the construction of ‘Alligator Alcatraz,’ the Everglades immigration detention facility, which is set to close in the coming days.

According to the FDEM, the state has signed contracts totaling at least $245 million for work at the facility, which was developed by repurposing the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport in Ochopee.

The largest contract, valued at $78.5 million, was awarded to Jacksonville-based Critical Response Strategies for staffing, including corrections officers, camp managers, and IT personnel. Longview Solutions Group received $25.6 million for site preparation and construction, while IT company Gothams secured a $21.1 million contract to provide services such as access badges and detainee wristbands, according to FDEM.

What People Are Saying

A DHS official in a statement to Newsweek: “This activist judge’s order is yet another attempt to prevent the President from fulfilling the American people’s mandate to remove the worst of the worst—including gang members, murderers, pedophiles, terrorists, and rapists from our country. Not to mention this ruling ignores the fact that this land has already been developed for a decade.

What Happens Next

Florida officials will continue efforts to empty the camp in line with a federal judge’s order to close the remote Everglades facility.

Lies, lies, lies — I wouldn’t believe a single word from these people. For starters, if everything were above board, they’d welcome inspections from Congress and others.

This disgraceful travesty called Alligator Alcatraz can’t be shut down fast enough!

Florida denies uprising at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’
The Florida Division of Emergency Management rejected claims that any uprising had occurred.

https://www.newsweek.com/florida-denies-uprising-alligator-alcatraz-2122577

Guardian: Detainees report alleged uprising at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’: ‘A lot of people have bled’

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Reports of incident were denied by Florida and Ice officials as detainees say they were beaten and teargas was fired

Reports of incident were denied by Florida and Ice officials as detainees say they were beaten and teargas was fired

Richard Luscombe in MiamiFri 29 Aug 2025 12.37 EDTShare

Guards at Florida’s “Alligator Alcatraz” immigration jail deployed teargas and engaged in a mass beating of detainees to quell a mini-uprising, it was reported on Friday.

The allegations, made by at least three detainees in phone calls to Miami’s Spanish language news channel Noticias 23, come as authorities race to empty the camp in compliance with a judge’s order to close the remote tented camp in the Everglades wetlands.

The incident took place after several migrants held there began shouting for “freedom” after one received news a relative had died, according to the outlet. A team of guards then rushed in and began beating individuals indiscriminately with batons, and fired teargas at them, the detainees said.

“They’ve beaten everyone here, a lot of people have bled.

Detainees report alleged uprising at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’: ‘A lot of people have bled’
Reports of incident were denied by Florida and Ice officials as detainees say they were beat and teargas was fired

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/29/alligator-alcatraz-uprising-florida-immigration

Guardian: ‘Petri dish for disease’: attorney raises alarm of possible Covid outbreak at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’

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A respiratory disease is running rampant through Florida immigration jail, according to attorney of a detained person

An outbreak of a respiratory disease, possibly Covid-19, is running rampant through the remote Florida immigration jail known as “Alligator Alcatraz”, according to the attorney of an infected detainee removed from the camp last week.

Eric Lee said he was told by his client Luis Manuel Rivas Velásquez that conditions at the facility had deteriorated significantly since Thursday as more migrants held there by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agency experienced symptoms.

Lee said authorities removed Rivas Velásquez, a 38-year-old Venezuelan man, from the camp after he was diagnosed in a hospital visit last week, then secretly taken to a similar facility in Texas.

Protesters at the gates of the jail in the heart of the Florida Everglades have recorded a number of instances of ambulances arriving and leaving.

Lee said the hastily erected tented camp, which Democratic lawmakers have decried for holding thousands of undocumented detainees in cages as they await deportation, is a “petri dish for disease”.

He added: “Based on what multiple detainees have told me, in the last 72 to 100 hours, there is some respiratory disease which has made the majority, or I would even say vast majority of detainees, sick in some form.

“There are people who are losing breath. There are people who are walking around coughing on one another. Their requests for masks from the guards are denied, and they only are allowed to shower once or maybe twice a week.

“I said to Luis, ‘pass the phone. Let me hear it from somebody else. I just want to make sure that people’s stories are straight.’ And unfortunately they very much are.”

The development follows a claim by a woman, a state licensed corrections officer, who said she contracted Covid-19 after working at the camp in unsanitary conditions for about a week last month, and was subsequently fired.

“We had to use the porta-johns. We didn’t have hot water half the time. Our bathrooms were backed up,” the woman told NBC6 News after being granted anonymity to discuss conditions there.

“[The detainees] have no sunlight. There’s no clock in there. They don’t even know what time of the day it is. The bathrooms are backed up because so many people [are] using them.”

The Florida department of emergency management, which is responsible for operations at the jail, did not immediately respond to a request from the Guardian for comment.

In a statement to the Miami New Times, Stephanie Hartman, a department spokesperson, did not answer questions about a possible outbreak, but insisted: “Detainees have access to a 24/7, fully staffed medical facility with a pharmacy on site.”

Lee said Rivas Velásquez told him in a phone call that he pleaded for medical attention for 48 hours after contracting breathing difficulties, and eventually collapsed inside the metal cage in which he and dozens of other inmates were being held.

He said his client was taken to Miami’s Kendall regional medical center, where he was diagnosed with a respiratory infection, then returned only briefly to the Everglades camp before disappearing for three days. Lee said Rivas Velásquez called on Sunday from a new detention camp in El Paso, Texas.

“He said when he was returned to the Alcatraz facility he asked the guards to provide his medical records and they said they would not do that,” Lee said.

“The guards came to his bed, opened his pillow, took all the poetry and letters he’d been writing, and all the notes he’d been taking about his experiences, and told him he’s no longer allowed to write.”

Apart from the brief call from Texas, Lee said he had no further information about his client’s wellbeing.

“I haven’t heard from him for two days now. I have no idea how he’s doing or frankly whether he’s alive or not. It’s hard to wage a legal fight when you don’t even have access to your client,” he said.

If the outbreak is Covid, Lee added, it would have consequences beyond Alligator Alcatraz.

“The disease doesn’t recognize the prison walls and guards are going to get sick. They’ll give it to their kids, it’s going to get into the Miami school system, people are going to get sick and die as a result of the conditions that are in this facility,” he said.

‘Petri dish for disease’: attorney raises alarm of possible Covid outbreak at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’
A respiratory disease is running rampant through Florida immigration jail, according to attorney of a detained person

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/12/attorney-covid-outbreak-alligator-alcatraz

Raw Story: ‘Oversized kennel’: Alligator Alcatraz worker blows the whistle on ‘inhumane’ conditions

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An Alligator Alcatraz worker is blowing the whistle on “inhumane” conditions at the notorious immigrant detention facility in South Florida after working there for less than a month.

Speaking to NBC6, Lindsey, a corrections officer, said that she only wanted to give her first name out of fear of retribution against her or her family.

She confirmed she arrived at the facility on July 6 and was there for about a week before she caught COVID and was forced to isolate.

Lindsey’s comments come just 24 hours after Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) announced that they “identified 510 credible reports of human rights abuse” against immigration detainees.

In response to questions about the report, DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs, Tricia McLaughlin, said in an email to NBC, “Any claim that there are subprime conditions at ICE detention centers are false.”

DHS bragged on X that they are hard at work attacking “fake news” and announced that they “have the backs of the brave men and women of @ICEgov, who risk their lives every day protecting our homeland.”

But Lindsey said that her experience was different.

“When I got there, it was overwhelming,” she told NBC6. “I thought it would get better. But it just never did.”

She said that she knew going into it that the team would be living in a trailer, but the report described the conditions as “harsh” for the corrections officers as well as the detainees.

“We had to use the porta-johns. We didn’t have hot water half the time. Our bathrooms were backed up,” she said.

“The bathrooms are backed up because you got so many people using them,” she added.

Her story confirms the account from detainees and their family members that DHS has also denied.

When it comes to where the detainees are held, Lindsey called it “an oversized kennel.”

The large cages hold 35 to 38 inmates. There are about eight cages per tent.

“They have no sunlight. There’s no clock in there. They don’t even know what time of the day it is. They have no access to showers. They shower every other day or every four days,” Lindsey continued.

There were reports of flooding at the facility on the day that President Donald Trump toured the tents. Lindsey said that it has continued and each time it rains water floods into the tents.

Lindsey noted that despite Trump’s promise only to deport criminals, there are a number of people there who are not criminals.

“These people are still human. They pulled them from their livelihood. They’re scared. They don’t speak our language,” she said.

When Lindsey got COVID, the facility accused her of trying to falsify medical paperwork, and she was fired. She denies their accusations.

“I was fired. And yeah, I’m pissed off. But more so than ever, like they’re doing wrong,” she said.

Detainees complained last month that there was a lack of food, and when they were provided something to eat, there were worms in it, the Associated Press reported in July. That report also cited the overflowing sewage, which was discounted by spokesperson Stephanie Hartman of the Florida Division of Emergency Management.

“The reporting on the conditions in the facility is completely false. The facility meets all required standards and is in good working order,” she claimed.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Trump want to see the facility as the model for others.

‘Oversized kennel’: Alligator Alcatraz worker blows the whistle on ‘inhumane’ conditions

https://www.rawstory.com/ice-detention-center-whistleblower