HUMSI — Human Security Initiative

Human Impact Project

A living database documenting reported immigration enforcement incidents and their human impact.

Salvadoran man with torture protection beaten, restrained in full-body WRAP, and pepper-sprayed during repeated deportation attempts to Mexico

2026

Country of origin: El Salvador

A Salvadoran man with protection under the Convention Against Torture says ICE agents and detention-center guards broke his finger, pushed fingers into his ears and eyes, and held him in the WRAP full-body restraint for hours while transporting him to the U.S.-Mexico border. Mexican officials refused to accept him in his injured state, and he was returned to a U.S. detention center, where he went three days without pain medication for his broken finger and had difficulty walking. The government tried to deport him again several times; on one attempt he wrapped the seatbelts around his chains to resist and Border Patrol agents pepper-sprayed and assaulted him before handing him to Mexican officials. He feared harm in Mexico and onward deportation to El Salvador. "I asked for help in the United States and they themselves ended up torturing me," he said.

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