Otero County Prison Facility

A privately operated prison for men in Chaparral, New Mexico — run by Management & Training Corporation under contract with the New Mexico Corrections Department, and the only private prison still holding New Mexico state inmates.

Overview

The Otero County Prison Facility is a prison for men in Chaparral, in Otero County in southern New Mexico near the Texas state line. It holds New Mexico state inmates under a contract between Management & Training Corporation (MTC) and the New Mexico Corrections Department (NMCD). The facility houses men at Levels 2 and 3 and operates a Restrictive Housing Unit.

NMCD assigns custody level based on factors that include sentence length, time remaining, and conduct, and a person’s custody level can change during incarceration. The custody class and housing unit held at a given prison affect whether visits are contact or non-contact, so families confirm the arrangement that applies to the specific person before a first visit.

What Makes the Otero County Prison Facility Different

The Otero County Prison Facility is the only privately operated prison still holding New Mexico state inmates. New Mexico returned most of its formerly private prisons to state operation in 2021 and ended its largest private contract — the GEO-operated Lea County Correctional Facility in Hobbs — by June 30, 2025. The Otero County Prison Facility remains under contract with MTC. A west wing of the facility is dedicated to housing and programming for NMCD inmates, and the facility runs a Sex Offender Treatment Program (SOTP).

Because the facility is privately operated, NMCD’s statewide rules — such as the approved visitor list and the off-site mail system — still apply, but the visiting schedule and some day-to-day arrangements are set locally by MTC rather than by the state. Families confirm those details directly with the facility.

This prison is separate from the federal Otero County Processing Center, an immigration detention site also located in Chaparral. The two facilities have similar names and are in the same town but are operated by different entities and hold different populations; a person held by NMCD at the Otero County Prison Facility is not at the federal processing center.

Visiting

The statewide NMCD rules above — the approved visitor list, the dress code, ID, and item limits — apply at the Otero County Prison Facility. The facility’s own arrangements:

Getting There and Parking

The Otero County Prison Facility is at 10 McGregor Range Road in Chaparral, in Otero County in southern New Mexico. Chaparral sits just north of the Texas state line, near El Paso, Texas, and Las Cruces, New Mexico. The nearest large commercial airport is in the El Paso area to the south.

Parking is on site. Visitors confirm current entry procedures, the visitor-processing location, and what may be brought onto the grounds with the facility before arriving, because electronic devices and personal items are generally not permitted inside.

Nearby Services

Chaparral has limited lodging and dining, with a wider range of options in the El Paso, Texas, area to the south and in Las Cruces, New Mexico, to the northwest. Emergency medical care is available in the surrounding region, with larger hospitals in El Paso and Las Cruces. Visitors traveling a long distance generally find the most options for fuel, food, and overnight stays along the Interstate 10 corridor.

Mail

New Mexico does not deliver personal mail to the prison itself. Since February 2022, incoming personal mail for people in New Mexico Corrections Department facilities is sent to an off-site Securus processing center in Seminole, Florida, where it is opened, inspected, and scanned. The scanned mail is delivered electronically to the person’s Smart Communications tablet (the tablet program began July 1, 2024); the original paper is not forwarded to the facility.

Personal mail must be addressed with the incarcerated person’s full committed name and NMCD number, followed by the facility’s Seminole, Florida P.O. Box. The box for the Otero County Prison Facility is PO Box 9211, Seminole, FL 33775-9211. The current box for each facility is listed on the New Mexico Corrections Department’s Inmate Mail Addresses page.

Legal mail, publications, and packages are handled differently and do not go to the Florida scanning box. Legal and privileged mail goes to the facility and is opened in the person’s presence under NMCD policy CD-151200; publications and books are subject to that policy’s approved-source rules. Confirm the current routing for legal mail, publications, and packages with the facility before sending.

Learn More

• Visiting a New Mexico prison — approved visitor lists, scheduling with each facility, and what to expect at the visit.
• Sending mail in New Mexico — the off-site scanning system, addressing, and how legal mail and publications are handled.
• Phone, video, and messaging — Securus calls, Smart Communications tablets, and video visits.
• Sending money — how to deposit funds to a trust account and to a Securus Debit account.
• Medical care — who provides health care in New Mexico prisons and how to raise a concern.
• Transfers and reception — how people enter the system through the Reception and Diagnostic Centers and how transfers work.