If you need another reason to avoid the USA, here is one. The republican government has been ramping up the budget of ICE and treating the Homeland agency has a federal military group targeting anyone profiled to be an illegal immigrant — and as a result often using excessive force against US citizens. People in which ICE has no jurisdiction or authority for.
Now before I get into this list, I want to make clear that some of the people detained by ICE are not good people and warranted being detained and exported. They are noted appropriately. The problem is, they were never deported because they were killed and we haven’t received answers on why for most of our victims. That’s awfully suspicious.
The Death Toll
2025 was the deadliest year for those in ICE custody since 2024, per The Guardian. With over 30 deaths and counting…
January 20
January 23
Genry Ruiz Gruillén, 29, died in a hospital in Hialeah, Florida. In regards to his death, we only know what ICE told us, which that Genry had difficulty breathing, prompting a medical emergency before he died.
January 29
Serawit Gezahegn Dejene, 45, died at a hospital in Phoenix, Arizona. He was cleared to apply for aslyum. In regards to his death, we only know what ICE has told us, which that he had elevated heart rate and fatigue and was seen by healthcare providers who said he had a possible lymphoma diagnosis.
February 20
Maksym Chernyak, 44, died at a hospital in Miami. Fled from Russia-Ukraine war with his long term partner and came into US on humanitarian parole. He was arrested on January 26 over a domestic violence claim which his partner described as a misunderstanding that was exacerbated by a language barrier. According to ICE, he experienced vomiting and seizure activity and transffered to a hospital on February 18. The preliminary cause of death was listed as “bleeding from the brain”.
February 23
Juan Alexis Tineo-Martinez, 44, died at the Centro Medico Hospital in San Juan, Puerto Rico. According to ICE, Juan claimed that he was having leg pain and was transferred to the hospital for evaluation, where he died. The nature of the death was not disclosed.
April 8
Brayan Garzón-Rayo, 27, died at Phelps country jail in Rolla, Missouri. In March Brayan was accused of credit card fraud and was transferred to ICE custody. Prior to his death, he spoke to his mother, complaining about stomach pain and poor quality of food. The official cause of death is not known.
April 16
Nhon Ngoc Nguyen, 55, died at a hospital in El Paso, Texas. Nhon was a legal resident. In 1991 he was convicted of a second-degree murder and served his time at San Quentin prison. ICE opened a deportation case for Nhon in 2013, after he was released. ICE apprehended Nhon in Albuquergue in February and had him detained in an El Paso processing center for days before his family lawyer, Tin Nguyen located him. Tin said that Nhon had been showing early signs of dementia and possible side effects from a head injury prior to his detention.
Shortly after his detention, Nhon began experiencing helath complications. ICE offered to release him as long as his family was able to provide round-the-clock acute care, but the family didn’t have health insurance and could not pay for such health care. According to ICE, Nhon’s condition began rapidly declining and eventually died from acute pneumonia.
April 25
Abelardo Avellaneda Delgado, 68, died while in transit from a local jail to a federal detention center. Abelardo worked in the US for 40 years raising a family and worked on farms, but he did not had legal status. Abelardo was apprehended in Statenville, Georgia and his conditions quickly deteriorated in jail. En route to the detention center, he came unresponsive with highly elevated blood pressure. ICE said the cause of death is under internal investigation but have yet to provide any conclusion.
June 7
Jesus Molina-Veya, 45, died at the Steward detention center in Lumpkin, Georgia.
According to ICE, Jesus was arrested, charged and convicted of child molestation, hit-and-run and profession of controlled substances. On June 7 he was found unresponsive in his cell and while an official cause of death have not been released, an ICE spokesperson called it a suicide.
June 23
Johnny Noviello, 49, died at the Bureau of Prisons’ federal detention center in Miami. A Canadian who became a lawful permanent resident of Florida in 1991. They moved there because Johnny was diagnosed with epilepsy and would often become ill during cold winters, so the family decided to resettle in a warmer climate.
Johnny spent time in prison for selling drugs including hydrocodone and oxycodone and was released early due to good behaviour. Following release sometime after, he was apprehended by ICE on May 15 at the department of corrections probation office.
The cause of death is not known and is under investigation according to ICE.
June 26
Isidro Pérez, 75, died at a Florida hospital. He served time in prison due to a conviction of marijuana possession in the 1980s. On June 5, Isidro was apprehended at a community center and transferred him into Krome north service processing center. Three weeks later, Isidro died from undisclosed causes.
July 19
Tien Xuan Phan, 55, died at the Methodist hospital in Live Oak, Texas. Tien was detained earlier in June for failing to leave the US after a removal order. According to ICE, he was transferred to a hospital after experiencing seizures, vomiting and becoming unresponsive. His death remains under investigation.
August 5
Chaofeng Ge, 32, died four days after entering ICE custody in Pennsylvania. He arrived in the US unlawfully in 2023, where he was incarcerated at the southern border. He was released and settled and moved to Queens, New York where he worked as a delivery driver. He was arrested for pocessing several stolen credit cards and eventually detained by ICE where he later died while being retained. According to ICE, Chaofeng died by suicide.
August 31
Lorenzo Antonio Batres Vargas, 32, died while detained at the Central Arizona Florence correctional complex.
Lorenzo was a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca), entering the US as a 5-year old child. On August 2nd, Lorenzo was charged with possession and use of drug paraphernalia. ICE took Lorenzo into custody and transferred him into the detention center. ICE claims that the cause of death is unknown and is under investigation.
September 12
Silverio Villegas González, 38, shot and killed by an ICE agent while attempting to flee from a traffic stop in Chicago.
September 18
Santos Banegas Reyes, 42, died at the Nassau country correction center in New York. He was apprehended the day before by ICE. He was found “not breathing” in his cell and according to ICE, the cause of death appeared to be liver failure complicated by alcoholism. His family has contested the cause of death however.
September 22
Ismael Ayala-Uribe, 39, died at the Adelanto detention center. Ismael was protected legally under the Daca program, but was denied renewal due to being convicted for driving under the influence. He was then apprehended in August during an ICE raid at Valley Auto Wash, where he worked for 15 years. Where he fell ill, starting with a cough and fever, then onto other medical complications he was transffered to a hospital where he died. His mother claimed he was free from any medical conditions. ICE says they are still under investigation.
September 24
Norlan Guzman-Fuentes, 37, was killed when a human opened fire at the ICE field office where Norlan was being held. Norlan was arrested for driving under the influence, which was later dropped.
September 29
Miguel Angel García Medina, 31, killed at an ICE field office in Dallas. He was shackled inside the government van just outside the field office, where a gunman opened fire on September 24. He died five days later of his gunshot wounds.
September 29
Huabing Xie, died at El Centro regional medical center in Calexico, California. ICE claims that Huabing experienced what appeared to be a seizure and became unresponsive and medical personel tried to administer life-saving measures before emergency services arrived and transferred to the hospital where he died.
October 4
Leo Cruz-Silva, 34, died while detained by ICE at the Ste Genevieve county jail. He was arrested by local police for public intoxication before he was handed off to ICE custoy. According to ICE, Leo died by suicide.
October 11
Hasan Ali Moh’D Saleh, 67, died after being detained at the Krome detention center. Saleh was charged and convicted of exchanging food stamps for cash and served time. He was released in 2020, under the condition of supervision where he had to regularly check in with ICE.
After being placed in Krome, he was transffered to a local hospital due to a high fever and became unresponsive. A physician had cardiac arrest listed as a prelimary cause of death.
October 23
Josué Castro Rivera, 25, killed while fleeing ICE agents. He was on his way to his gardening job when ICE pulled his vehicle over. He was struck by a vehicle while attempting to cross Interstate 264.
October 23
Gabriel Garcia Aviles, 54, living in the US for 30 years, died after being detained by ICE. ICE claims that Garbriel has died of natural causes and complications of alcohol withdrawal. His family contests, claiming that he had always been healthy prior to his detention.
Worth noting that during his detention, his family repeatedly attempted to contact Gabriel but was refused by the detention center.
October 25
Kai Yin Wong, 63, died at a hospital in San Antonio, Texas.
Kai became a legal permanent resident in 1970. He was convicted of sexual abuse of a child in 2010 and served 14 year sentence. He was then transferred to ICE and ordered to be deported. He was helt in a ICE processing center in Pearsall, where he comlained of shortness of breath and transferred to a lcoal hospital. He was air-lifted to another hospital when he started to experience heart failure and possible pneumonia. For surgery, he was then transferred to a third hospital for heart valve repair, where he died from complications.
December 3
Francisco Gaspar-Andrés, 48, died at an El Paso hospital due to suspected kidney and liver failure, according to ICE. He was pulled over by a highway patrol officer who asked to see his identification. Later he was handed over to ICE, where he ended up at Camp East Montana, a detention facility inside a Texas military base. Francisco was repeatedly seen by medical staff for symptoms including bleeding gums, sore throat, body aches, fever, jaundice, and hypertension. He was transferred to a hospital on November 16 where he was diagnosed with hyponatremia and was later placed on dialysis and palliative care, before his death in December, according to ICE.
His wife claims he was relatively healthy prior to his detention.
December 5
Pete Sumalo Montejo, 72, died at Valley Baptist medical center. Became a legal permanent resident in 1962. In 1992, he was convicted of aggravated sexual assault of a child, and was convicted for possession of a controlled substance in 2024 according to CIE.
While in Montgomery processing center, he began experiencing several medical complications incudling shortness of breath, hypoxia, anemia, and septic shock resulting from pneumonia according to ICE.
December 6
Shiraz Fatehali Sachwani, 48, died at a hospital in Fort Worth, Texas.
Shiraz came into the US in 1996 as a visitor and overstayed his visa, according to ICE. He was arrested by border patrol in 2017, and ordered to leave the US after he did not appear at an imigration court hearing in 2019. In June, ICE located him at a jail in Euless, Texas. He spent more than five months at the Praireland detention center before he died. ICE claims Shiraz died of natural causes and had a history of medical conditions includign chronic respiratory, liver and kidney issues.
December 12
Jean Wilson Brutus, 41, died at the Delaney Hall detention facility, one day after taken into custody.
Jean came into the US as an asylum seeker. ICE claims the death was caused by natural causes. Andy Kim, a democratic senator spoke to about 80 detainees who described receiving poor medical care and being served digusting meals including raw meat.
December 14
Fouad Saeed Abdulkadir, 46, died of “medical distress” according to ICE.
Fouad gained a green card in 2018. In 2023, he was charged with wire fraud and misuse of public funds. ICE took custody of him in July 2024 and detained him at the Moshannon Valley processing center where he died a year and a half later.
December 14
Delvin Francisco Rodriguez, 39, died at Adams county correctional center.
He was due to be deported, but Delvin was found to not have a pulse. He was then transferred to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.
December 15
Nenko Stanev Gantchev, 56, died at the North Lake processing center.
Nenko lacked a green card, but was married to a US citizen and lived in the USA for 30 years. He was ordered to leave the USA in 2023.
He was discovered unresponsive on the floor of his cell during routine checks. Official cause of death was still under investigation according to ICE.
January 7, 2026
Renée Good, 37, an American citizen who was fatally shot by an ICE agent during “Operation Metro Surge”, an operation involving knocking on door-to-door in neighbourhoods and questioning residents.
Renée was receiving conflicting commands, one to move her vehicle, and another to get out of the vehicle. Jonathan Ross, the ICE agent who killed Renée was standing in front-left area of the vehicle, when Renée reversed her vehicle to clear the path way of her exit. She cut her wheel to move into the direction of traffic, away from Jonathan and proceeded to drive forward. Jonathan Ross while remaining upright, fired three shots, one through the windshield, and two through the side of her vehicle as she passed him. He later left the scene.
January 8, 2026
Luis David Nico Moncada & Yorlenys Betzabeth Zambrano-Contreras, both were fatally shot by a CBP agent during a traffic stop.
January 14, 2026
ICE agent shot a man from Venezuela during an operation, in Minneapolis. The name of the man is not disclosed. This is following volatile protests from from the killing of Renée Good.
