Detainees arriving at the immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades known as ” Alligator Alcatraz ” are given color-coded uniforms and wrist-bands, then segregated based on their criminal history and whether they’re considered a flight risk, according to a handbook given to detainees.
The handbook presents strict rules on hygiene and dress, portraying an environment inside the remote detention center that starkly contrasts with the deplorable conditions detainees described shortly after it opened in July. The handbook was made public as part of a lawsuit over whether detainees have proper access to attorneys.
The court case is one of three lawsuits filed by environmental and civil rights groups over conditions at the detention center, which was built this summer by the state of Florida and operated by private contractors and state agencies.
A federal judge in Miami ordered in August that the facility must wind down operations within two months, agreeing with environmental groups that the remote airstrip site wasn’t given a proper environmental review before it was converted into an immigration detention center. But operations continued after the judge’s preliminary injunction was put on hold in early September by an appellate court panel.
President Donald Trump toured the facility in July and suggested it could be a model for future lockups nationwide as his administration pushes to expand the infrastructure needed to increase deportations.