New Orleans, Louisiana - Immigration and Customs Enforcement detains more than 6,000 immigrants on any given day in Louisiana. A new report has revealed the horrific conditions they suffer behind bars.

The 107-page report – put together by a coalition of human rights groups – accuses New Orleans Immigration and Customs Enforcement Field Office (NOLA ICE) of regularly abusing people in detention and says some of its activities meet the legal definition of torture.

"In NOLA ICE detention, officials isolate people with viable defenses to deportation from the legal and language resources needed to fairly present their claims. And they use abusive treatment in punitive conditions to coerce people into renouncing those claims and accepting deportation to escape the misery of detention," the report states.

The publication followed a two-year investigation launched in April 2022 based on interviews with 6,384 people and visits to nine immigration jails in Louisiana, eight of which are run by private prison companies.

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The people detained – the vast majority of whom have neither been accused nor convicted of a crime – are waiting for the federal government to process their immigration and asylum applications. In the meantime, they suffer systematic physical, sexual, and verbal abuse; solitary confinement; denial of medical and mental health care; and other forms of mistreatment.

NOLA ICE officials also routinely deprived people in detention of basic necessities like clean drinking water, adequate food, protection from extreme temperatures, and hygiene and menstrual products.

"United States citizens are paying taxes for these immigration jails and people are suffering. ICE doesn't use that money to take care of us, they are just torturing us," one interviewee said. "They just torture people using the tax money of United States citizens."

Immigrants who have been detained and find themselves in removal proceedings are entitled to due process.

But the geographical isolation of NOLA ICE detention facilities and regular denial of language assistance makes it difficult for many to access legal assistance in their immigration cases.

The report states that 97% of people surveyed expressed fear of persecution or torture if they returned to their country of origin, yet 71% were navigating the US immigration system without legal counsel.

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Meanwhile, Geo Group, a for-profit prison company active in Louisiana, reported its 2023 annual revenue at $2.41 billion, while another private contractor, LaSalle Corrections, does not report its earnings. Both companies spend millions of dollars on campaign contributions and lobbying politicians to support anti-immigrant measures.

"Immigration detention is lucrative, even more so when jails avoid providing basic services like suitable food and clothing," the report states.

"To ensure maximum profits, NOLA ICE jails are incentivized to cut costs by understaffing facilities, paying detained people subminimum wages for custodial and other labor services, and denying sufficient food, clothing, and medical care, among other abuses."

To end the abuses, the report calls for a reduction in the scale of immigrant detention, the closure of NOLA ICE facilities, a ban on the use of solitary confinement, enhanced oversight measures, and greater investments in community-based support programs.