People detained at an overcrowded federal immigration camp in Mississippi were sickened by a mystery gas leak, then denied medical care when they complained of headaches and other symptoms, it has been alleged. A lengthy power outage at Adams county detention center, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility run by the private operator CoreCivic, also left it without air conditioning for two days this week, according to one detainee who contacted the Guardian through his family. As a result, he said, people detained there were forced to spend hours outside in near 100F heat in blazing sunshine and with no shade, or left to swelter inside in cramped cells.
Tensions at the center, he said, were rising, and more arguments and physical altercations were taking place between people there, leaving him and others fearful of violence that he said inadequate staffing levels would not be able to handle. The allegations come as a third person who was held in ICE custody at the Delaney Hall detention center in New Jersey, run by the GEO Group, another government contractor, was reported to have died; and an inspection report of the Adams county facility in Natchez found 23 violations of use-of-force or restraint standards. Those deficiencies, found by inspectors from ICE’s office of detention oversight in May, led to the downgrade of the Adams county’s facility rating from superior in 2025 to acceptable/adequate this year.
The gas leak is said to have occurred last Saturday. And when they came back in, it still smelled of gas. And then some of the men were getting headaches and symptoms of inhaled gas.
They were never really told where the leak came from, how it was resolved, or was it fully resolved. So there are a lot of people getting sick, and they have begun putting people three to a cell that was designed for two.” The power outage, the detained person reported, happened on Monday. Electricity was partially restored on Tuesday, he said, allowing lighting and other essential operations to function, but air conditioning remained out until late Wednesday.
Mississippi Today reported in March that the 14-acre Natchez jail holds more than 2,000 detainees, but that only 9% of those detained had any kind of criminal record. The person who contacted the Guardian has an active asylum application for a green card. He has no criminal record, and was arrested by ICE in January at a routine appointment.
CoreCivic, which has headquarters in Tennessee, operates dozens of detention and correctional facilities around the country, many under contract to ICE. The company reported a 26% rise in revenue to $2.2bn in 2025, which Patrick Swindle, its president and chief executive officer, credited to “the trust of our government partners”. At the same time, CoreCivic has come under increasing scrutiny for conditions and treatment of detainees inside its vast network.
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