ICE facility in Louisiana reports its second detainee death in less than 2 months

A second detainee has died in less than two months at a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Louisiana where a recent inspection report found insanitary conditions, problems with medical care and the use of excessive force.

Mamuka Artmeladze, a 43-year-old from the country of Georgia, was found unresponsive June 4 at Winn Correctional Center in Winnfield, Louisiana, ICE announced in a press release Sunday. ICE said staff began lifesaving measures before he was taken by ambulance to a local hospital, where a doctor pronounced him dead less than an hour later.

Additional circumstances surrounding the death were not available, and ICE said the cause of death is pending an autopsy. Artmeladze had been detained at the facility, managed by the Winn Parish Sheriff’s Office and ICE contractor LaSalle Corrections, for nearly four months.

The facility holds more than 1,500 male detainees, and like the majority of them, Artmeladze did not have a criminal record. Artmeladze entered the country illegally on an unknown date and the Border Patrol allowed him to temporarily remain in the country under ICE supervision after encountering him in September 2022, ICE said. He was arrested in Alabama in February after ICE determined he no longer had lawful status to remain in the U.S.

He is the 19th detainee who has died in ICE custody since Jan. 1 and the second at Winn since April 11. A coroner’s report obtained by The Associated Press shows 49-year-old Alejandro Cabrera Clemente was found unresponsive during a security check that day, staff tried to resuscitate him, and he died after he was taken to the same hospital as Artmeladze.

The coroner ruled that Cabrera, a native of Mexico who had recently lived in Tennessee, died from natural causes due to cardiovascular disease. Cabrera woke up coughing and wheezing about 2½ hours before he was found unresponsive, but said he was OK and went back to sleep, the report said.

A separate ICE report on Cabrera’s death said detainees alerted nearby nursing staff to his unresponsiveness, and they found him “with left-sided facial droop” and his skin discolored due to low blood oxygen. Cabrera received treatment for high blood pressure and other medical problems during his months of detention, the report said.

The deaths come amid mounting scrutiny over whether ICE detention facilities are medically neglecting detainees and forcing them to live in inhumane conditions, charges that ICE denies.

The Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General issued a report last week that said an unannounced inspection at Winn found violations of standards governing environmental health and safety, food service, use-of-force, medical care and other subjects.

The report described water leaking through vents in the kitchen, holes and exposed insulation in the intake building’s ceiling, and food stored in freezers above required temperatures.

Medical staff at Winn failed to keep updated treatment documents and laboratory testing records, which could “negatively impact detainee health care and safety,” the report warned.

The inspection also found violations of use-of-force policies, including an officer who put a detainee in a banned chokehold and a second officer who stabbed a detainee’s thumb with a pen after the detainee refused to remove his hand from a door.

The report said ICE agreed with nine recommendations to improve conditions at Winn, and had implemented several of them.