2025 Is ICE’s Deadliest Year In 20 Years
“The families of some of the deceased have denounced the fact that the victims had no prior condition that would have predicted a tragic end,” EL PAÍS reports
2025 has become the deadliest year for detained immigrants in federal immigration custody in two decades. EL PAÍS reported this month that at least 22 individuals have died while in ICE custody in the current fiscal year, making this the deadliest year for detained immigrants since 2005.
They have been as young as 27-years-old. Brayan Garzón-Rayo, a Colombian immigrant who died by suicide in April, “did not receive a mental health evaluation due to staffing shortages,” KCUR reported. “Jail staff found Garzón-Rayo unresponsive in his cell with a blanket wrapped around his neck on April 7, according to the ICE report.” Isidro Pérez, a 75-year-old Cuban man, died while in immigration custody after six decades in the U.S. The fishing aficionado “lived on a boat anchored near a park in Key Largo, south of Miami, and spent his days sitting on a bench in a coastal park, his family says,” EL PAÍS reported in July.
“The families of some of the deceased have denounced the fact that the victims had no prior condition that would have predicted a tragic end,” EL PAÍS noted in its October report.
One grieving mom said that she was not aware of her 39-year-old son suffering any health difficulties when he suddenly died after being jailed at Adelanto ICE Processing Center, a privately-operated detention facility in southern California. “Her son, Ismael Ayala-Uribe, died on September 22 at Victor Valley Hospital, where he was transferred from the Adelanto Detention Center in California. Ayala-Uribe was arrested on August 17 while working at a car wash in Huntington Beach, where he had been employed for 15 years.”
“The family maintains that his health was good and that they have not received an explanation as to how, in just over a month, the 39-year-old Mexican died in detention,” EL PAÍS reported in July.
And, these deaths have been coming with alarming frequency. Just two weeks after Ayala-Uribe’s death, Huabing Xie, a Chinese immigrant of unreported age, died after being detained at Imperial Regional Detention Facility, another privately-operated site in southern California, L.A. Taco reported. Detention staff “reported Xie having a seizure. He became unresponsive at 2:13 p.m. CPR was given and a defibrillator was used, administered by medical personnel on site. Xie was transported to the hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.” The outlet further stated that federal immigration officials actually violated their own policies on how quickly they must publicly report in-custody deaths.
“The record for deaths in ICE custody was set in 2004, a year after the immigration agency’s creation,” EL PAÍS continued in its October report. “There were 32 reported deaths that year. The following year there were 20, a figure not surpassed again until 2020, during the Covid pandemic, when 21 deaths were recorded, according to government data.” But as researchers at the American Immigration Council note, the current administration has been “deadlier for ICE detainees than COVID-19 pandemic.”
These alarming statistics, lack of transparency, and failure to follow internal guidelines come “as ICE is also holding nearly 60,000 people in immigration detention, the highest number in several years,” NPR reported. According to data from TRAC Immigration, the overwhelming majority of immigrants in federal immigration detention, 71.5%, have no criminal convictions at all. “Former agency officials are warning that increased detention population, decreased oversight, an increase in street and community arrests and continued difficulties staffing medical teams will result in more deaths,” NPR continued.
An ongoing Congressional investigation has already uncovered hundreds of credible reports of shocking human rights abuses in immigration detention facilities, including dozens of allegations of physical and sexual abuse and the mistreatment of pregnant women and children as young as two, including U.S. citizens. This includes 41 reports of physical and sexual abuse, 32 reports of abuses against pregnant women and kids, reports of denial of health care and legal representation at facilities in more than two dozen states, Puerto Rico, and even U.S. military bases in Cuba and as far away as Djibouti in the Horn of Africa.
The ongoing probe has even alleged that detention facility staffers have used solitary confinement – which is considered torture by many experts – to punish detained individuals for reporting allegations.
Following a series of complaints and lawsuits, “ICE is scrambling to hire doctors, nurses, pharmacists, and other healthcare workers” for positions “ranging from dental hygienists through psychiatric nurse practitioners to medical risk managers and data scientists,” The Independent reported. But whether the approximately 45 new positions will make any significant impact as federal immigration officials detain an unprecedented number of immigrants remains to be seen.
ICE’s death reporting page also does not show the at least three individuals who’ve tragically lost their lives while apparently trying to flee immigration agents. Just last week in Virginia, Josué Castro Rivera was heading to a gardening job when he tried to flee ICE on foot and was hit by a vehicle on the interstate. “He had a very good heart,” his brother said. “He didn’t deserve anything that happened to him.”
As families grieve and continue to press for answers, the Disappeared In America campaign said that immigrant community members who’ve lost their lives while in ICE custody will be remembered during Day of the Dead vigils set to take place this weekend.
“These cultural and creative events uplift the sanctity of life,” said the campaign’s Disappeared In America Weekend of Action website, “and affirm that our communities will not be erased or forgotten.” Day of the Dead, or Día de Muertos, is observed from Nov. 1 to Nov. 2 and is a traditional “day of celebration, particularly for the people in Mexico and Central America, and for many Mexican Americans in the United States,” said the National Museum of the American Latino. “It is a day to honor and commemorate the lives of the dearly departed and to welcome the return of their spirits.” These celebrations typically include an ofrenda, or altar, that features photos of deceased loved ones, candles, marigolds, and even favorite food items.
Advocates erected one such ofrenda outside the privately-operated Otay Mesa Detention Center in southern California on Wednesday, Fox 5 San Diego reported. “Groups like the American Friends Service Committee, Detention Resistance, Free Them All-SD and more organized the vigil. Director of the American Friends Service Committee Pedro Rios said they want to make sure those who died in custody are not forgotten.”
“Rios said they gathered ‘to honor them and to recognize them as important because they have names, they have families that likely did not have to be under detention, we want to make sure they are not forgotten,’” the report continued. In Los Angeles, Venice Bakery’s ofrenda similarly remembers individuals who’ve died while under ICE watch.
“They were part of our community, and our community is being targeted, and they needed to be remembered,” said the bakery’s operator. “Sorry, it’s emotional because it’s my community. It’s the people I grew up with. It’s the people I see day in, day out. It’s family members. It’s my son’s friends and their family members. And that can happen to any one of us because we all look Latino. It doesn’t matter if I was born here, if I wasn’t born here, if I have papers. I look Hispanic, I look Latina. So it can happen to me, and that’s scary.”