Autopsy Reveals Mexican Immigrant Committed Suicide While Detained at Eloy Detention Center
Autopsy results reveal that the death of a Mexican immigrant who died in custody at the Eloy Detention Center last month was caused by suicide.
After the Mexican national's body was found in his cell on May 20, other detainees went on a hunger strike suspecting that he had died from abuse. However, an autopsy report released Wednesday by the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner found that 31-year-old José de Jesús Deniz-Sahagún committed suicide at the center, about 60 miles north of Tucson.
According to chief medical examiner Dr. Gregory Hess, Deniz-Sahagún died of asphyxiation after shoving a knee-high sock down his throat. Hess added that a small white plastic handle, probably from a toothbrush, was also found in his stomach. Deniz-Sahagún was the fourth immigrant detainee to die in ICE custody within the fiscal year, reports the Tucson Sentinel.
Just before his suicide, Deniz-Sahagún a mental health evaluation showed that he suffered from "delusional thoughts and behaviors for which he had to be restrained by corrections staff," the report said. Deniz-Sahagún was then placed on a suicide watch. Officials removed the watch order the next day and instead placed him in a single person cell while checking on him every 15 minutes, Hess said.
A group of 200 immigrant detainees launched a hunger strike at Eloy Detention Center Saturday morning to protest his death and call attention to conditions at the facility, said immigrant rights activists and detainees' families.
In addition to Deniz-Sahagún's death, detainees complain that they are forced to work at the center for $1 per day and are sometimes denied medical treatment. Detainees also claim a second man died in custody.
Several detainees wrote letters in Spanish saying that Deniz-Sahagún was "brutally beaten" and placed for days in solitary confinement before his death, reports The Huffington Post. One letter speculates that he committed suicide as a direct result of being put in solitary confinement.
ICE records show that Deniz-Sahagún had been deported twice in the last four years. At the time of his death, he was awaiting a to see an immigration judge on his pending deportation, reports Tuscon.com.
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