Over the years, critics have described New York's Metropolitan Correctional Center – the site where disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein died of an apparent suicide – as having inhumane conditions.

Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán called the place "torture."

“Since the government will send me to a jail where my name will not ever be heard again, I take this opportunity to say there was no justice here,” Guzmán said at his sentencing July 17. "It has been psychological and mental torture 24 hours a day."

Guzmán, who was held at the MCC until his transfer July 19, said he was completely cut off from sunlight and forced to drink unsanitary water. His lawyers complained on his behalf months earlier, saying the lights at night and noisy air conditioning made sleep almost impossible.

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The MCC first opened in 1975, originally designed to hold 474 inmates, according to website Gothamist. That number is now 763, leading to complaints of overcrowding.

The detention center has held a number of high-profile inmates, including Ponzi scheme mastermind Bernard Madoff and 1993 World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Ahmed Yousef.

Lawyers for Mob boss John Gotti said in 1991 that the jail deprived their client of "basic human rights," according to UPI. UPI reported that inmates called the lockup "roach motel."

Gothamist spoke with a dozen people who spent time at the MCC and heard reports of vermin infestations, violent guards and filthy conditions.

"I thought there was nowhere worse than Rikers Island,” Melvin Rodriguez, who spent three weeks at MCC, told Gothamist. "The cells (are) very small and at nighttime you hear the mouses, see waterbugs in the shower."

Uzair Paracha, a former inmate of two years, told the New York Post that guards frequently strip searched him, isolated him and left lights on for 22 or 23 hours a day.

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Epstein, who was awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges, was put on suicide watch after guards found him with bruises on his neck three weeks ago, though it was unclear whether the injuries were self-inflicted or from an assault. But at the end of July, he was taken off the watch, a person familiar with the matter told the Associated Press.

His removal from suicide watch would have been approved by both the warden of the jail and the facility’s chief psychologist, said Jack Donson, a former prison official who worked for the Bureau of Prisons for more than two decades.

Epstein led a life of luxury before being charged with drug trafficking and sexual abuse of minors. He experienced more favorable conditions while serving a 13-month sentence for prostitution charges in a Palm Beach County stockade. Through a work-release program, he was allowed to work at his office most days.

Contributing: John Bacon, The Associated Press