Venezuelan man deported to CECOT prison sues U.S. for $1.3 million
Source: CBS News
Updated on: March 24, 2026 / 2:52 PM EDT
A Venezuelan man who was deported from the U.S. and detained in the notorious CECOT prison in El Salvador last year has become the first known ex-prisoner to sue the U.S. for damages, filing a lawsuit in federal court Tuesday seeking at least $1.3 million in compensation. In an interview with CBS News, Neiyerver Adrián Leon Rengel, 28, described the months he spent at the prison as "total hell."
The Venezuelan man said he and his fellow detainees were constantly beaten and mistreated by prison guards. He recounted having to drink the same water he and other prisoners bathed in. Prison guards also told him he would be there for 90 years, he said. "There came a point when I thought about hanging myself with the sheet they gave us," Leon Rengel told CBS News in Spanish.
Leon Rengel was one of several hundred Venezuelan men deported by the U.S. to El Salvador, where they were held incommunicado in CECOT for roughly four months. They were freed in a prisoner swap in July 2025.
A report by researchers at Human Rights Watch found the CECOT prisoners endured months of physical and psychological abuse, including some cases of sexual assault. It determined that their time in CECOT amounted to "arbitrary detention" and "torture" under international law. Leon Rengel's lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, asks the court to award him at least $1.3 million for what his lawyers say was false imprisonment and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cecot-prison-lawsuit-neiyerver-adrian-leon-rengel/
Link to SUIT (PDF) - https://assets1.cbsnewsstatic.com/hub/cms/prod_cms_alt/file/2026/03/24/176a8e54-9915-414a-8a8f-b0b31f13d7fb/cecot_lawsuit.pdf
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