WASHED ITS HANDS

ICE Accused of Neglect After Man, 29, in Its Custody Dies

Prisciliano Trejo Ricano was “coughing up blood” behind bars—and his family says his pleas for care were ignored.

A 29-year-old man has died of aggressive leukemia days after ICE released him from custody as he lay in intensive care. Prisciliano Trejo Ricano, brought to the U.S. from Mexico at the age of three, spent weeks pleading for help inside the CoreCivic-run Stewart Detention Center in Lumpkin, Georgia, PunchUp reports. “This week I’ve been dealing with a severe sore throat, coughing up blood morning and night, and very bad migraines, and I still haven’t been treated or given any medication,” the Daily Beast’s sister Substack PunchUp reported that he wrote on Facebook on July 10—his birthday. Advocates say a July 6 request for care went unmet until he was hospitalized on July 13. He then slipped into a coma two days later and was cut loose from ICE custody on July 16. Trejo died on July 24. “When an individual is no longer in ICE custody, ICE is no longer responsible for them,” the Department of Homeland Security told PunchUp in a statement. CoreCivic did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Tom Latchem exposes the secrets, scandals, and stories that powerful people and institutions want to keep under wraps. Follow all of his reporting at PunchUp on Substack.