Prison 1580 in Havana has been a constant source of complaints about mistreatment, corruption and human rights violations.
HAVANA, Cuba – Located in the Havana municipality of San Miguel del Padrón, the 1580 penitentiary center has been a constant source of complaints about mistreatment, corruption and human rights violations, especially denial of medical care. The political prisoner Adrián Curuneaux Stivens, confined in that prison since last year, confirmed to CubaNet that anyone who demands medical attention there may receive physical abuse from the prison authorities.
The activist, sentenced to a total of 11 years of deprivation of liberty for the alleged crimes of attack, contempt and assault, described in a letter how recently after waking up with his face swollen, the Internal Order Official (FOI) known as El Duque hit him and sent him to a cell for demanding that a doctor treat him.
“I was so swollen that I didn’t recognize myself. At 5:20 AM I asked for medical attention from the FOI known as El Moro and he told me that it was too early. Two hours later when I called him again I realized that they had changed the guard and El Duque was there. He responded to my call, I explained my problem and he responded that because I was screaming and because of his reproductive organ he was not going to take me to the doctor,” said the opponent.
According to Curuneaux Stivens, after continuing to scream to be taken to the medical postThe Duke takes him out of the detachment, handcuffs him with his hands behind him and begins to raise his arms upward, tilting his face towards the floor.
“They call that position a wheelbarrow. Then he puts my face against the wall, hitting me against it repeatedly, he took me to a dungeon and hooked my handcuffs to a bar that they have as a means of torture. I was there for about an hour, then Lieutenant María Lina arrived and she was the one who ordered him to take me to the doctor; he, under protest, had to take me,” explained the activist, vice president of the Opposition Movement for a New Republic.
Complaint by Reinaldo Martínez Lemes
Through a letter sent to CubaNet, inmate Reinaldo Martínez Lemes denounced “the Directorate of Prison 1580, under the command of Lexis Borrero Ramírez” for the violation of his human rights and the denial medical care.
According to the letter, Martínez Lemes, who was on extra-penal leave for a year and is undergoing heart surgery, was denied admission by the prison authorities “to the National Hospital to receive another surgery.”
“Instead of medical attention, the only thing I have received is psychological abuse. They have denied me that right since I have been here. I am already completely swollen, even to my insides, and I am short of breath every day, but they don’t even take us older adults out to sunbathe,” he said.
“In bus #16 of 1580, where there are older adults, disabled people, a blind man and me, who has heart surgery, all human rights are violated. Recently a guard offended me with my mother by calling him to go to the medical post,” added the inmate.
Complaint by Roberto Bárbaro Molinas Gasborí
Inmate Roberto Bárbaro Molinas Gasborí also confirmed through a small note how he has been denied medical attention for three months, during which time he has suffered from a rectal fissure.
“On occasions when I have demanded it, what I have received has been mistreatment by the FOI or key holders. On one occasion I was hit in the face with a cane by the guards El Duque and Ramón, the most corrupt that 1580 has, or rather, “El Secadero”, led by Lieutenant Colonel Lexis Borrero Ramírez,” he denounced.
The authorities of 1580 prohibited the entry of sheets and notebooks into the prison due to consumption and drug traffic within the prison, which makes it difficult to file complaints about denial of medical care and violation of human rights in general.
According to an annual report from the Cuban Prison Documentation Center published last October, between March 2024 and March 2025, 1,330 violations of the human rights of imprisoned people were recorded.
“The most frequent violations documented include harassment and repression with 1,176 incidents, followed by 555 complaints about general health problems, 454 cases of denial of medical care, 341 related to inadequate living conditions and 260 referring to nutritional deficiencies,” the document detailed.
