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Carlos Josué Marchena Marchena was just 36 years old when he died in the Winn Correctional Center immigration prison in Winnfield, Louisiana, earlier this month. He had repeatedly told his family and another detainee that he wasn’t receiving the insulin shots he needed to manage his Type 1 diabetes; he was missing meals and lacked enough water, too.
Another immigrant inside the camp reportedly said that the day before Marchena died, he had been in pain, vomiting, and “pale purple and wet with sweat.”
Marchena is the third person to die in Winn Correctional Center this year and among the at least 65 people who have died in immigration detention since Donald Trump retook the White House, according to a nonscientific tally the Prospect maintains based on death notices, news coverage, and federal databases for ICE and Customs and Border Protection, among other sources.
He’s also among the numerous immigrants inside detention who have reported widespread medical neglect that in some cases turns fatal.
According to the boilerplate language Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) included in a press release about his death, Marchena “received proper medical care and was seen by medical professionals.” The agency, it said, provides comprehensive medical care “from the moment individuals arrive,” including medical, dental, and mental health care. “At no time during detention is a detained noncitizen denied emergency care.”
But immigrants, their families and friends, elected officials, attorneys, and advocates say that is a lie. And even data provided by the federal government itself shows ICE is failing to provide adequate medical care.
Last Friday, the federal government released 33 mortality reviews of immigrants who have died in federal detention since 2019. Nearly all found significant failures and together show a pattern of neglect.
Among other failures, ICE and private detention staff refused to give detainees routine medication for ongoing medical conditions; confiscated medicine they arrived with and refused to administer it; failed to provide follow-up care to serious conditions; misread X-rays and other diagnostic tests; lacked the ability to administer CPR properly; gave people the wrong medication; and did not send people experiencing health crises to the emergency room in time. Staff routinely ignored requests for care and failed to communicate with one another about immigrants’ conditions.
Even in four instances where a review found that detention staff provided medical care “within safe limits of practice,” reviewers still noted serious failures. When Ernesto Rocha-Cuadra, a 42-year-old Nicaraguan man, died in the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center in 2023, staff who responded to his medical emergency “had a limited sense of urgency,” despite the fact that he was suffering a heart attack. The report also noted that he had access to and used illicit drugs inside the facility.
“No matter how many times we hear this same horrendous information, it doesn’t get better and it keeps getting worse,” said Setareh Ghandehari, advocacy director at Detention Watch Network. “Even if there are standards, even if there are requirements, when those standards aren’t met there is no consequence.” |
