The Cuban Prisons Documentation Center (CDPC), an organization based in Mexico, documented 93 events related to individuals deprived of their liberty during September, of which 79 involved violations of rights. Additionally, it collected information on at least four deaths linked to the Cuban penitentiary system, according to its monthly report.
The non-governmental organization documented "a picture of deterioration in Cuban prisons, fundamentally marked by the denial of medical care, poor nutrition, restrictions on communication, and the deaths of detainees," the text details.
The reports come from 34 detention centers — prisons, forced labor camps, and correctional facilities — distributed across 12 provinces and the special municipality of Isla de la Juventud.
The provinces with the highest concentration of incidents were Camagüey, Havana, and Mayabeque. The prisons most mentioned in the report were Kilo 8 and Kilo 7 in Camagüey, and the Quivicán prison in Mayabeque.
The CDPC identified 72 affected individuals: 68 men and four women. Another 23 reports described situations that impacted the entire population of the same establishment.
By categories, the denial of medical care tops the list with 27 reports, followed by health status (26), food (19), communication restrictions (15), and transfers (9).
Deaths of prisoners: complaints of lack of medical attention and hunger
One of the cases is that of political prisoner Florentino Morono Torres, incarcerated in the provincial prison of Las Tunas. He suffered a heart attack in his cell on September 18 without receiving timely medical attention and died two days later at the Dr. Ernesto Guevara General Teaching Hospital in that city.
The common prisoner Reinier Ramírez Domínguez died at the Calixto García Hospital in Havana, 17 days after being granted a temporary leave from prison. The CDPC states that "his health had already been severely compromised due to inadequate medical care in prison."
The CDPC summons the opposition figure José Daniel Ferrer, who disseminated a notice received from the Mar Verde Prison in Santiago de Cuba, where an inmate reported the deaths from starvation of Denisen Omar Sierra and a jailed man identified as Abelito. Relatives of inmates at this facility have reported extreme hunger, overcrowding, and contaminated water.
"In addition to individual cases, the source mentions another ten prisoners in critical condition due to lack of food and severe malnutrition, information that the CDPC is investigating to understand the situation of each inmate," the report specifies.
An independent journalist and political prisoners
The report identifies the most frequent victims as those detained for political reasons and those suffering from chronic or infectious diseases: tuberculosis, diabetes, asthma, psoriasis, and HIV.
Among the prisoners with the most recorded events is the independent journalist Henry Constantín, director of La Hora de Cuba, who was arrested in Camagüey in September and later transferred to the maximum-security prison Kilo 7. Also listed are the political prisoners Roberto Pérez Fonseca and Vladimir Castillo Llanes, in Quivicán, and Ediolvis Marín Mora, in Kilo 7.
The CDPC also documented reprisals against those who protest the conditions of confinement: suspension of visits and calls, punishment cells, and beatings.
An underreporting in an opaque system
The organization warns that its figures represent "an underreporting of actual events and victims" and attributes this limitation to "the systematic opacity of the Cuban regime," which does not publish prison mortality statistics and does not allow access to independent observers.
For its part, Cubalex documented 12 deaths linked to state custody during September —the highest monthly figure since February 2026— including eight in prisons, two former detainees who died shortly after their release, and two recruits from Mandatory Military Service. Both organizations operate with different methodologies, and their counts should not be combined, although both reports include complaints related to the lack of medical care and malnutrition.
On the other hand, Prisoners Defenders reported a new record of 1,372 political prisoners in Cuba as of October first, surpassing the previous high from August.
Between March 2024 and March 2025, the CDPC itself recorded 60 deaths in state custody and 1,330 rights violations, including 402 cases of denial of medical care and 224 cases of food deficiencies.
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