DALLAS, Texas — A Guatemalan man in Border Patrol custody in Arizona died Saturday, two days after he was taken into custody for illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, according to a statement from border authorities.
Customs and Border Protection announced late Sunday that a 29-year-old man died at a local hospital in Tucson, Arizona, Saturday morning. The death marks the second time since President Joe Biden took office in January that the government has disclosed the death of someone in federal custody at the border.
“Late on the evening of March 25, the man was apprehended by Casa Grande Border Patrol Agents. On the afternoon of March 26, the man showed signs of medical distress at the Tucson Coordination Center in Tucson, Arizona,” CBP said in a statement. “CBP medical personnel immediately attended to him and notified local Emergency Medical Services (EMS). After EMS arrived, the man went into cardiac arrest and after being stabilized was transported to Carondelet St. Joseph’s Hospital in Tucson where he was admitted to the Intensive Care Unit. On March 27, the man was pronounced deceased by hospital medical personnel.”
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CBP’s internal affairs officer is investigating the incident, as is normal protocol. The Pima County Medical Examiner’s Office will conduct an autopsy. Guatemalan and DHS officials are in the process of being notified, CBP said.
CBP did not reveal if the man was initially taken into custody as part of a family. Nearly all single adults interdicted at the southern border are immediately returned to Mexico or their home country in an effort to prevent federal detention facilities from becoming overcrowded amid the coronavirus pandemic, an indication that the deceased man may have been traveling with a child or had been exempted from being immediately sent south of the border after being apprehended.
The death follows a similar incident in Eagle Pass, Texas, in early March. An adult man, whose nationality nor the details surrounding his time in custody are known, died March 10.
Last week, a nine-year-old Mexican boy died after attempting to cross the Rio Grande from Mexico to the Texas town of Eagle Pass. The incident is the first known loss of life of a child at the border amid an influx of thousands of unaccompanied children and families attempting to enter the U.S. The numbers are rising more with every week as the Biden administration struggles to get control of the international boundary.
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CBP did not immediately respond to a request for comment about other deaths in custody since the start of fiscal 2021 on Oct. 1, 2020. The Department of Homeland Security agency reported 10 deaths among the 851,000 people it took into custody on the southern border in fiscal 2019.
