Officials are investigating the death this week of a 39-year-old Mexican man who was in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) custody in southern California.
Ismael Ayala-Uribe was transferred Sunday from the Adelanto Ice Processing Center to a regional hospital for surgery on an abscess on his buttock, according to an Ice statement.
Hospital staff found him unresponsive and “initiated lifesaving measures” but he was declared dead around 2.30am on Monday, the statement said. The cause of death is under investigation.
In addition to the abscess, Ayala-Uribe suffered from hypertension and tachycardia, an abnormally fast heart rate, according to Ice.
Federal records show that more than a dozen people have died in immigration detention since January, when immigration officials began to implement Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda.
His family said Ayala-Uribe had high blood pressure but was otherwise healthy. His brother told the Los Angeles Times that Ayala-Uribe got sick with a cough and a fever shortly after he arrived at the Adelanto facility on 22 August.
Ayala-Uribe’s family told the Los Angeles Times that his cries for help and concerns about his health fell on deaf ears at the privately run Ice facility.
His mother told LA Taco that she had watched her son shake, turn pale, and cough persistently over the last few weeks. He seemed particularly distraught during a recent visit.
“I can’t anymore, mom,” Ayala-Uribe told his mother.
Ayala-Uribe’s arrived in the US when he was four years old, and had lived in Westminster, California, ever since. He was picked up in an immigration raid on his workplace, Fountain Valley Auto Wash, where his family said he had worked for 15 years. While Trump campaigned on the mass deportation of criminals, workplace raids have quickly become a staple of American life.
According to Ice, Ayala-Uribe entered the United States at an unknown date and location. He applied for, and received, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals protection in 2012. In 2016, US Citizenship and Immigration Services denied his application to renew his Daca status. He had been convicted of two DUIs.
Mexico’s foreign relations department offered its condolences to the man’s family and said the Mexican Consulate in San Bernardino would follow up with authorities at the immigration detention center to ensure a thorough investigation to “fully clarify” the cause of Ayala-Uribe’s death. Mexican officials are in contact with the family to offer legal assistance and other help.
Mexico also reiterated its commitment to protect and defend the human rights of Mexicans abroad.
Ayala-Uribe marks the second death in Ice custody this week, following Santos Reyes-Banegas, a 42-year-old Honduran citizen who died in New York’s Nassau correctional center, just one day after Ice picked him up. Authorities said Reyes-Banegas died of liver failure, a claim his family has questioned and called “absurd”.
