Asylum-Seekers Forced To Wait In Mexico Face Horrid Conditions In Shelters, Legal Aid Groups Say

It took up to three days and the smell of his decomposing body for staff at a shelter in Mexico to realize that an immigrant trying to get asylum in the US had died. At another shelter for people waiting to have their asylum cases heard in the US, two women didn’t return after venturing out to get medicine, and employees refused to allow their roommates to call authorities.

These are just two circumstances alleged in two letters sent to the US government by legal service providers that were obtained by BuzzFeed News. They highlight the dangerous conditions that immigrants are forced into as they wait in Mexico for their asylum cases to be adjudicated in the US. Even outside shelters, they also face violence and kidnapping by criminal organizations.