Detainees Describe Gas, Extreme Heat and Medical Problems at Mississippi ICE Facility — Is America Better Yet?
People held at a privately operated ICE detention center say they were exposed to an unexplained gas smell, extreme heat and inadequate medical care. The company running the facility disputes key parts of their account.
By Roberto Zapatero
Is America Better Yet?
A man detained at an immigration facility in Mississippi told his family that people around him became sick after smelling what they believed was gas.
Then, he said, another problem hit.
The power went out, the building became dangerously hot, and people were forced to spend hours outside in Mississippi heat or remain inside hot cells.
Those are allegations from inside the Adams County Correctional Center, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility near Natchez, Mississippi.
CoreCivic, the private company that operates the facility, disputes several of the allegations.
That leaves two very different descriptions of what happened inside the detention center during the second week of August.
And there should be records capable of showing which account is accurate.
What the detainee says happened
The Guardian reported August 14 that a detained man, communicating through his family, said detainees smelled what they believed was gas on Saturday, August 8.
His wife told the newspaper that detainees were evacuated into the afternoon heat for hours. After they returned, she said, the smell remained and some people complained of headaches and other symptoms.
The Guardian withheld the man's identity because of concerns about possible retaliation.
His wife also said detainees were not told what caused the smell or whether the problem had been resolved.
The detainee reported another problem beginning Monday, August 10.
He said a power outage left people without air conditioning for roughly two days. According to his account, detainees were at times kept outside in temperatures approaching 100 degrees without shade or inside hot cells.
He also described increasing crowding, including three people being housed in cells intended for two.
Those accounts have not been independently verified by Is America Better Yet?
CoreCivic disputes the account
Ryan Gustin, CoreCivic's senior director of public affairs, gave The Guardian a substantially different account.
CoreCivic said some detainees thought they smelled something resembling natural gas, but staff did not detect a gas smell.
The company said a maintenance worker inspected the facility and found no gas leak.
CoreCivic acknowledged that a storm caused a power outage on Monday. It said the outage affected the facility and surrounding community for about two hours and that emergency generators worked as intended.
According to the company, a transformer later failed and caused lighting problems in the common area of one housing unit.
But CoreCivic said the heating, ventilation and air-conditioning systems were never interrupted.
The company also denied that anyone was refused medical care.
Those claims directly conflict with the detainee's account.
At this point, neither account should be treated as independently established fact.
Communication restrictions are also alleged
The detainee's wife told The Guardian that detainees were not given tablet devices during the disruption and believed officials were trying to prevent them from telling family members what was happening.
She also said detainees feared being placed in solitary confinement if officials believed they were organizing.
Is America Better Yet? has not independently verified those claims, and the currently available reporting does not establish why tablet access may have been limited or whether anyone was placed in segregation because of attempts to report conditions.
The facility had already drawn scrutiny from ICE inspectors
The new allegations come only months after ICE's Office of Detention Oversight inspected Adams County from May 5 through May 7, 2026.
ICE publicly lists that inspection, and the official inspection report includes findings involving use of force and restraints.
The Guardian reports that inspectors identified 23 violations involving use-of-force or restraint standards and that the facility's rating fell from superior in 2025 to acceptable or adequate in 2026.
Is America Better Yet? located the official ICE inspection report and confirmed that it is the May 5–7, 2026 Adams County inspection. However, the publicly accessible version available during our review did not allow us to independently reproduce the Guardian's count of 23 violations. We therefore attribute that number to The Guardian pending a complete independent review of the inspection record.
That distinction matters.
The May inspection does not prove that the allegations from August are true. But it does show that ICE inspectors had already documented concerns involving detention standards at the facility before this week's events.
A large ICE detention center
CoreCivic identifies Adams County Correctional Center as one of its facilities in Natchez.
The company announced in 2019 that the 2,232-bed center would operate under an agreement involving Adams County and ICE.
Mississippi Today reported in March that more than 2,000 people were being held there.
That makes questions about heat, medical care, emergency systems and overcrowding consequential for a large detained population.
Records should be able to answer much of this
This is not a dispute that depends entirely on memory.
If a possible gas leak was reported, there should be maintenance records.
If a transformer failed, there should be repair or utility records.
If emergency generators operated, there should be generator or maintenance documentation.
If housing areas lost air conditioning, facility temperature or HVAC records may show it.
If detainees sought medical treatment after reporting headaches or possible exposure, medical and sick-call records should exist.
If three people were placed in two-person cells, housing rosters and bed-assignment records should show it.
And if tablet access was restricted or detainees were placed in segregation, electronic-access and detention records may document those actions.
Those records are important because the current public accounts cannot both be completely correct.
A detainee says people endured prolonged heat, possible gas exposure and inadequate medical treatment.
CoreCivic says no gas leak was found, air conditioning remained operational and no one was denied medical care.
The next question is not which account sounds more believable.
It is what the records show.
What we know
The Adams County facility is used by ICE and operated by CoreCivic. A detained man and his family have made detailed allegations concerning a suspected gas exposure, heat, overcrowding, medical care and communication restrictions. CoreCivic has directly disputed several of those allegations. ICE also conducted a documented inspection of the facility in May 2026 that included use-of-force and restraint findings.
What we do not know
No independent evidence located during this review establishes that a gas leak occurred.
We have not independently verified that air conditioning was unavailable for two days.
We have not independently established that detainees were refused medical care.
We also have not independently confirmed why tablet access was reportedly limited, whether detainees were threatened with segregation for reporting conditions, or the precise number of people housed above intended cell capacity.
Those questions remain open.
What should be preserved
Records capable of resolving the dispute include facility maintenance logs, gas-detection or environmental testing records, transformer and generator records, local utility outage records, housing-unit temperature logs, medical sick-call records, clinic logs, housing rosters, bed assignments, incident reports, tablet-access records, segregation records and any CoreCivic or ICE after-action review.
Those records could turn competing claims into verifiable facts.
Until then, the allegations should remain allegations and CoreCivic's denials should remain part of the record.
That is where the evidence stands today.
Sources
- U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Adams County Detention Center Inspection 2026-001-047, inspection conducted May 5–7, 2026.
- U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Office of Detention Oversight facility-inspection index listing the May 5–7, 2026 Adams County inspection.
- The Guardian, Richard Luscombe, August 14, 2026, reporting detainee allegations and CoreCivic's response.
- CoreCivic, Adams County Correctional Center facility information.
- CoreCivic, September 3, 2019 announcement concerning its management agreement involving Adams County and ICE.
- Mississippi Today, March 27, 2026, background reporting on the Adams County facility and detained population.
I write for you,
— Roberto
www.isamericabetteryet.org