The taxi driver, the prison lieutenant and an alleged scheme to prey on immigrants at an ICE detention facility in Mississippi

For years, advocates warned that immigrants released from ICE facilities were forced to take exorbitant taxi rides; records now link accused driver to private prison firm in Natchez

When immigrants are released from one of the largest ICE detention centers in the United States, their freedom can begin with a warning: Pay a vastly inflated taxi fare, or risk being returned to incarceration.

“It’s a threat we’ve heard about many times,” said Frances Kelley, project coordinator for Louisiana Advocates for Immigrants in Detention (LA-AID), recalling the account of a person recently released from the Adams County Correctional Center outside Natchez, Mississippi. “If you do not pay me for a taxi ride, you’re gonna be put back in detention.”

The group said it raised concerns with federal agencies and members of Congress about the scheme about five years ago, but nothing has been done, and little has been publicly reported about who, if anyone, has profited from the practice.

Now, The Mississippi Independent has identified a connection between a Natchez-area driver accused of exploiting recently released immigrants and a longtime senior corrections officer at the privately run detention center, based on state and county records, social media posts and text messages.

For years, LA-AID has said that people released from ICE facilities in Louisiana and Mississippi have been victims of taxi-fare extortion, despite federal detention standards that require facilities far from public transportation to provide free rides.

Those standards have largely been ignored in recent years, paving the way for unscrupulous drivers who have charged fares ranging from $200 to $600 per passenger for rides that should be as short as 10 minutes.

A local taxi driver who witnessed the scheme over several years confirmed for The Mississippi Independent the names of the two people involved, one of whom works for CoreCivic, the company that operates the detention center.

“The only people I know who were involved with it were the lieutenant at the facility, Tameka Moore Anderson, and her husband, Otis Anderson,” said James Wynn, 31, the owner of Wynn Transportation, a Natchez-based taxi company that publishes its rates online and charges all passengers the same fares regardless of who they are or where they are from. “Nothing seems to have happened after I reported them to the federal government and CoreCivic. I just kind of gave up on it.”

Otis Anderson was first linked to the alleged scheme through text messages shared with The Mississippi Independent by El Molino Informativo, a Spanish-language news outlet based in New York City that today published a related article by Emma Llano. The messages, sent after 8 p.m. on April 2, 2026, show a person identifying himself as “Anderson taxi” discussing payment and destination with a cousin of a juvenile passenger recently released from Adams County Correctional Center. He asked for screenshots confirming that a $300 payment had gone through, reportedly on the Chime app.

The man wrote in the message that his cousin wanted to go to the bus station. Anderson responded by saying he was taking the juvenile to the Baton Rouge airport, about two hours from the detention center. The Natchez bus station is about 13 minutes away.

The juvenile told El Molino Informativo that he was in Anderson’s vehicle with two other men who were also told to pay $300. It is unclear why Anderson said he was taking the passengers to the Baton Rouge airport. Flights from the airport usually stop departing between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m., according to the airport’s website, and historical flight records reviewed by The Mississippi Independent did not show departures after 8 p.m. on April 2.

Otis Anderson’s cellphone number is connected online to Anderson and Son Transportation, a publicly advertised Natchez taxi business. State business filings list him as the owner of the company, which was dissolved in January 2022 but has received online reviews within the last year.

When contacted by The Mississippi Independent, Anderson declined to answer questions about the allegations.

“I respectfully decline to comment on the matters you referenced,” Anderson wrote, without denying involvement. “I do not wish to participate in an interview or provide statements regarding this issue.”

He asked not to be contacted again, then signed off as “Mr. Anderson.”

According to the El Molino Informativo article, Anderson said he first became involved in immigrant taxi services after he saw several released migrants waiting at a bus station and decided to offer his services to CoreCivic, and told the outlet he does not share his earnings with employees of CoreCivic, DHS or ICE.

Wynn said Otis Anderson has been known to arrive at the Adams County Correctional Facility with a large passenger van to transport greater numbers of released immigrants, each paying hundreds of dollars. Kelley said that’s something she’s seen at numerous immigrant detention facilities in Louisiana.

The Mississippi Independent cross-referenced Otis Anderson’s principal home address listed in the state business filings with Adams County property records and found that he shares a home address with Tameka Moore Anderson. County records show the couple married in June 2011.

Tameka Moore Anderson is pictured with or mentions her husband in numerous recent social media posts across their accounts, including birthday and anniversary posts. In a June 10, 2026, post, she wrote that she had worked at Adams County Correctional Center for 17 years.

Although she does not identify her rank or job assignment in that post, multiple social media posts by her CoreCivic manager refer to her as “Lieutenant Moore,” tag her personal account and identify her as working in the facility’s R&D property unit. R&D refers to receiving and discharge.

For advocates who have believed that released detainees were being steered toward favored drivers, the connection made by The Mississippi Independent was significant.

“We have long suspected that there was some connection between some of the taxi drivers and the detention center employees,” Kelley said.

Tameka Moore Anderson did not respond to questions about her role at CoreCivic or whether she had any involvement in her husband’s taxi service.

The Mississippi Independent also did not receive responses from Adams County Correctional Center warden Rafael Vargara or CoreCivic’s headquarters to questions about the alleged taxi scheme, the Andersons’ connection, or whether the arrangement would violate the company’s ethics and compliance policies.

The receiving-and-discharge unit is central to the moment detainees leave custody. Staff in that unit process releases, return belongings and valuables, close out commissary balances and discharge people from detention back into the outside world. Immigration advocates say that moment is also when released detainees are most vulnerable—often without working phones, identification, English fluency, cash or any clear understanding of where they are.

ICE guidelines say facility staff assigned to detainee discharges must allow each person to make one free phone call to arrange transportation. If transportation cannot be arranged and public transit is more than one mile from the facility, staff must provide free transport to a local bus, train or subway station while those services are still open. According to El Motivo Informativo, CoreCivic said in an email that although its officers provide transportation options to released immigrants, they have the option of finding transportation independently or with the help of their attorneys. The juvenile reportedly told the outlet he was not presented with any options other than Anderson’s taxi service

Adams County Correctional Center is roughly 12 miles from Natchez but much farther from major airports or full-service bus stations.

“A lot of times, the person would get released and they wouldn’t know their family had asked us to come,” Kelley said. “Then the facility would tell them to pay for a taxi, and they would sometimes use money out of their commissary.”

Advocates say the problems at release are not limited to transportation. Juan Torres, founder of the Alabama-based immigrant advocacy group Belong, said he has heard complaints that belongings were not always being returned by prison staff.

“Their personal belongings confiscated when they were detained are not being returned,” Torries said. “Somebody is pocketing their jewelry, watches, phones, if they are new enough, and cash.”

Wynn, the Natchez taxi operator, said he has encountered a similar problem after picking people up from detention.

“I’ve taken off with them before and gotten 30 or 40 minutes up the road, and the facility would call to say their belongings were left behind,” Wynn said. “The person would say, ‘Well, they wouldn’t give them to me.’”

When that happened, Wynn said he would turn around to retrieve the belongings.

But Kelley said that the released immigrant and their families are unlikely to risk going back or complaining.

“Many of these families are just glad the person is out,” Kelley said. “They are scared to raise anything. And if someone has been in detention, especially for a couple of years, they have a million things that are on their mind that are more pressing than the money that they just lost.”

Since 2019, LA-AID has tried to intercept people at the moment of release, picking them up from detention centers, driving them to airports or bus stations, buying meals, arranging hotel rooms and sometimes helping pay for tickets. Kelley said the group has helped approximately 20,000 immigrants during four years.

The group’s 2021 civil rights complaint cited several examples of detention centers flouting the Performance-Based National Detention Standards, which set procedures for detainee releases. The complaint said officials at eight of the nine facilities in the region, including Adams County, had told families that their detained relatives would not be released unless they paid for a taxi, without saying how much the rides would cost. In one case, the complaint said, a person was forced to pay $600 after a release was delayed by two hours.

The complaint was sent to the Department of Homeland Security and several members of Congress, including U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi.

By September 2021, LA-AID had persuaded one detention center to bus released detainees to a temporary church shelter, where volunteers provided food, Wi-Fi, phones and help contacting family members. At one point, Kelley said, four or five detention centers were coordinating similar releases, including the Basile facility in Louisiana, which arranged transport to the Lafayette airport or bus station.

The system worked for several years, Kelley said, largely because ICE and private prison operators could not keep up with the volume of releases and found it easier to let advocates coordinate with families.

But that system has collapsed, she said, as ICE has stopped nearly all discretionary releases.

“We wanted to make sure families weren’t having to pay an exorbitant amount for taxis, and to provide some level of communication and stability around the release process so families would know what was going on,” Kelley said. “We developed materials in different languages to send families information, explain to people where they were, what their choices were, and that they were out and safe.”

There is little public documentation of the taxi extortion allegations. But similar conduct has led to federal prosecutions elsewhere.

In New York, a taxi-extortion scheme targeting newly arrived asylum seekers led to federal kidnapping and extortion convictions. Prosecutors said a group of men targeted immigrants at the Port Authority bus terminal, sometimes posing as officials or helpful strangers before forcing victims into long and unwanted taxi rides. Families were then pressured to pay exorbitant fares, often more than $1,000, to secure their relatives’ release. Four men, including a driver, received prison sentences ranging from eight to 14 years.

In Louisiana, a 2021 Louisiana Voice article reported taxi fares of up to $400 and described one driver who allegedly refused to release a passenger to LA-AID’s free service. The article also said one driver charged three immigrant men $200 each for a 10-minute ride to the Monroe bus station in northern Louisiana.

Wynn left a comment on that article in 2023, saying his staff handled released immigrants with “love” and “care” and that he was aware of incidents in which correctional staff sought a cut of proceeds in exchange for steering families toward certain transportation companies. He called it a “disgrace.”

In an interview, Wynn said he has transported between 2,000 and 3,000 people released from regional ICE facilities over the last several years. Some were hungry, confused or unsure where they were, he said. His drivers are told to stop for food, clothing or a phone call if needed, and not to leave anyone at a station or airport until they know how to continue.

“These immigrants have been through so much already and can’t afford to pay those fares,” Wynn said. “I hate that greedy side of the world.”

Wynn said many of his passengers call once they reach their destinations. Some, he said, had cried in the back of his taxi after leaving detention, saying they wanted to go back to their home countries, even when home meant war.

“I just want to show people there are people with hearts out there,” he said.

Correction: A previous version of this article referenced an uncle of one of the immigrants communicating with “Mr. Anderson.” Emma Llano at El Molino Informativo, who provided the initial characterization, said it was the man’s cousin, not his uncle.

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Illustrations: Mike Williams