Why a private company is investigating rapes at an ICE detention center instead of the sheriff

San Diego County Sheriff’s officials failed to investigate at least seven reported sexual assaults at the privately run Otay Mesa immigration detention center in 2025, and records show the agency has ceded control of the cases to civilian administrators employed by the nation’s largest for-profit prison contractor.

Under a 2020 memorandum of understanding between the sheriff’s department and CoreCivic, detention center Warden Christopher LaRose has authority to decide whether to investigate rape allegations at the facility, which currently houses just under 1,500 federal immigration detainees, most of whom are in custody awaiting hearings and have not been convicted of a crime.

CalMatters obtained the memorandum after seeking additional information about the alleged rapes and four attempted sexual assaults through a California Public Records Act request. While a sheriff’s spokesperson said the agency was not investigating those cases, he said he was unable to turn over additional records because they were part of “a law enforcement investigation.”

CoreCivic in a written statement after this story first published said Otay Mesa staff conduct an administrative investigation of each sex assault allegation, though a spokesperson said the company does not conduct criminal investigations of sexual abuse allegations because it’s not a law enforcement agency.

“When a matter requires law enforcement intervention, we refer it to the appropriate authorities,” CoreCivic spokesperson Ryan Gustin said in a statement.

The company manages the detention center under a contract with the Department of Homeland Security and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency’s Office of Enforcement and Removal Operations. ICE officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Gustin said all allegations are recorded in a database, and “refer any potentially criminal matter to law enforcement.”

“Substantiated allegations result in disciplinary action and, where appropriate, referral for prosecution,” Gustin said. “If an individual is found to be at substantial risk of imminent sexual abuse, immediate protective action is taken.”

The company said that it has a zero tolerance policy for sex abuse and sexual harassment, and said detainees, staff or anyone present at a facility can report allegations in writing or through a hotline number. The company also said it offers anyone who makes an allegation medical, mental health and emotional support services.

CoreCivic did not respond to questions on whether it has any similar memoranda of understanding with other agencies, or details on any previous memorandum of understanding in San Diego County.

Seven privately run immigrant detention centers operate in California, with CoreCivic holding contracts for two of them. It could not immediately be determined if other detention centers have similar agreements with local law enforcement agencies.

“We’re horrified but not surprised to learn that numerous sexual assaults went uninvestigated at a CoreCivic facility,” said Susan Beaty, senior attorney with the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice advocacy group.

“Local and state enforcement agencies have a responsibility to use their power to protect the rights of Californians in detention, and hold accountable both ICE and private prison companies that profit to the tune of billions of taxpayer dollars to incarcerate immigrants in our state.”

A 2022 audit conducted by the outside company Creative Corrections found the facility met all federal standards for preventing sexual assaults.

San Diego County Board of Supervisors Chair Terra Lawson-Remer said she plans to question San Diego County Sheriff Kelly Martinez at a hearing Tuesday night on ICE transfers from county jails.

“I do not have much confidence at all in CoreCivic’s ability to investigate these very serious allegations,” she said earlier this month.

Supervisor questions sheriff after CalMatters story

A member of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors pressed San Diego County Sheriff Kelly Martinez about the memorandum of understanding after this story published Tuesday night. Sheriff Kelly Martinez said her department doesn’t have enough staff to investigate allegations of criminal misconduct at every civil and criminal detention facility in San Diego, including Otay Mesa.

“There’s something about an MOU that explicitly delegates to CoreCivic —” San Diego County Board of Supervisors Chair Terra Lawson-Remer began to say.

“Well, we could not have an MOU at all,” Martinez interrupted, “and they wouldn’t report to us and we wouldn’t investigate. So we have to also work with the people in charge of the facility, the reporting mechanism would still have to come from the facility.”

Lawson-Remer called the decision to turn over criminal investigation decisions to a private company “troubling,” and asked whether Martinez could sign an MOU that required a sheriff’s office investigation of every criminal allegation.

“I don’t know if we have the staff capacity for that, perhaps you could give me a bunch more positions and we could create an investigative unit,” Martinez said, and laughed.

“I completely understand your concern, and that it doesn’t look like it’s an appropriate way to investigate these complaints but I really don’t know how many are occurring.”

Martinez went on to say she was responsible for her own detention facilities, and investigating ones that don’t belong to San Diego County is “a difficult ask.”

San Diego County is in the midst of a separate legal battle with CoreCivic over the Otay Mesa Detention Center. In a lawsuit filed this month, the county alleges the Trump administration and Tennessee-based CoreCivic illegally blocked a public health inspection of the Otay Mesa Detention Center. According to the lawsuit, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement initially cleared county officials to enter the facility but reversed that decision when the inspection team arrived.

911 calls from detention center

Overall, there were 142 calls for service to the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department for the Otay Mesa Detention Center in 2024. Fourteen were identified as related to the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA), a 2003 federal law designed to prevent, detect and respond to sexual abuse and harassment in correctional facilities.

Last year, there were 159 calls for service to the Otay Mesa facility. Twenty-one calls were related to the Prison Rape Elimination Act, and of those, seven were allegations of rape.

CalMatters used a Public Records Act request to obtain a digital log generated by 911 dispatchers and emergency services for 2024 and 2025.

CalMatters attempted to obtain additional records about the sexual assault and attempted sexual assault incidents, such as the audio recordings of the 911 calls and the full dispatch log, but the sheriff’s department refused to release them stating the records were “records of a law enforcement investigation, or any investigatory or security files compiled by a law enforcement agency are exempt from disclosure.”

The records CalMatters obtained gave no indication whether the victims were detainees or employees. Similarly, the records gave no indication about the perpetrators.

The department’s memorandum of understanding with CoreCivic was signed and dated by former San Diego Sheriff Bill Gore in 2020.

“Under the Memorandum of Understanding…the facility’s Warden is responsible for investigating any allegation of sexual assault or abuse,” said Lt. David Collins, the media relations director for the sheriff’s department. Collins referred further questions about the incidents to CoreCivic.

He said CoreCivic “did not request our involvement” for any cases last year.

“Because no criminal investigations were initiated by the Sheriff’s Office, no reports were forwarded to the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office for consideration of charges,” he said.

If deputies had investigated, the MOU would require them to forward their findings to CoreCivic.

“Upon completion/closure of an investigation, Investigating Agency will forward a copy of the investigation report to the Facility for retention as part of Facility’s record-keeping requirements,” the MOU states.

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This story was originally published by CalMatters and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.