Guest Commentary written by

Paloma Esquivel

Paloma Esquivel is a journalist and press education specialist at the First Amendment Coalition.

The number of people held in privately-run immigration detention centers in California has more than doubled since last year, leading to widespread reports of unsafe and overcrowded conditions. 

Since September, six people have died at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center and the Imperial Regional Detention Facility, both in Southern California. Given the stakes, Californians have a vital interest in knowing what is happening in these facilities, which are run by private, for-profit companies. 

Instead, the centers are shrouded in secrecy, leading detainees to stage hunger strikes and sit-ins and to throw notes over barbed-wire fences to draw attention to their treatment. It’s unlikely the federal government will increase transparency at the centers anytime soon. 

But California could shed light on what is happening inside by making a targeted change to its open records law to require local agencies to disclose any 911 calls and related records about the detention centers.

Earlier this year, CalMatters reported that in 2025 the San Diego County sheriff received reports of several alleged sexual assaults at the Otay Mesa immigration detention center. 

The sheriff’s department didn’t investigate the allegations. Rather, it has an agreement with the center that gives the warden the power to decide if an investigation should be conducted.  

When reporters asked for records about the cases, citing the California Public Records Act, the sheriff’s department denied their request. It said it did not have to disclose the records because they fall under a carveout in the public records law that protects investigative records — even though the sheriff was not investigating the cases.  

I’ve experienced this lack of transparency firsthand. In 2017, I began reporting for the Los Angeles Times about a rash of deaths and attempted suicides at Adelanto. Detainees I spoke with described harrowing conditions that echo what others are saying today. 

One man told me he saw a fellow detainee hanging from the second floor with a bedsheet around his neck. What I remember most is he was horrified but not surprised.

“I think doing something like that is something that has crossed the mind of all of us who are locked up here,” he said.

A colleague and I requested official records, to learn about complaints from detention centers across the state and explain what was being done about them. When the federal government delayed or denied our requests, we asked local police for 911 call logs showing reported incidents at the facilities. 

The logs revealed hundreds of calls about violence or abuse at the centers. 

But most of those listings offered almost no details about what had been reported or what had come of the reports, because local agencies chose to withhold additional records. Over two years we pushed law enforcement to release enough information to allow us to assess those reports. 

Getting information on a system that affects the lives of thousands of people in our state should not be this difficult. 

Recent stories based on 911 calls in other states make it clear why California should act. In Arizona, reporters obtained audio of a 911 call from an ICE facility revealing that officers had pepper sprayed 47 detainees in an enclosed room. 

In Florida, reporters analyzed 911 calls about Alligator Alcatraz from staff and detainees’ loved ones, revealing confusion and desperation. And at the South Texas Family Residential Center, 911 calls exposed medical emergencies involving young children and pregnant women.

A law requiring disclosure of 911 calls and related records from privately-run detention centers in California would make a meaningful difference. 

The good news is state Sen. Lena Gonzalez, a Democrat from Long Beach, has introduced Senate Bill 423 to do that. The bill includes safeguards to protect legitimate investigative needs and victim privacy, while ensuring the right to know is not limited by local practices or agency discretion. 

The First Amendment Coalition, where I work training journalists on access to public records, co-sponsored the bill, along with the policy advocacy organization, Immigrant Defense Advocates. 

For California legislators this should be an easy call. Detainees should not have to resort to throwing notes over barbed-wire fences, just so the public knows what they are experiencing in our state.