On Monday, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, identified the 61-year-old man who authorities found dead last week at the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma.
In a news release, ICE said the man's name is Charles Leo Daniel, a citizen of Trinidad and Tobago. According to ICE, Daniel was convicted of murder in 2003. In 2020, an immigration judge ordered that Daniel be deported.
It's unclear why, despite the removal order, Daniel remained at the immigration detention center in Tacoma. The activist group La Resistencia said Daniel was in solitary confinement at the time of his death. ICE did not answer questions about why Daniel remained in the United States, and whether or not he was in solitary confinement.
According to a 2020 report by the University of Washington Center for Human Rights, the Northwest ICE Processing Center detains people longer, on average, in solitary confinement than any other ICE facility in the country.
Tacoma Police Detective William Muse said Daniel was found on Thursday, March 7, partially off the bed and slumped over. The detainee had first been found by one of the staff members at 10:43 a.m., Muse said. Staff pulled the detainee out of the room and tried life saving measures. The detainee was pronounced dead approximately an hour later.
According to Muse, who spoke to KNKX on Friday and did not identify Daniel by name, paramedics with the fire department had already attempted CPR and pronounced the detainee dead by the time police arrived on the scene.
Muse said there was nothing unusual or suspicious found but that Daniel appeared to be alone. The Pierce County Medical Examiner is expected to rule on the cause of the death.
The last time a person died at the facility was in 2018, when a 40-year-old man held in solitary confinement died by suicide.
The news comes as the Washington state Department of Health, as well as the Department of Labor and Industries, have repeatedly tried to inspect the facility. Both departments have been turned away by the private prison company running the center: GEO Group. When asked for comment, GEO Group directed all questions to ICE.
On Friday, the activist group La Resistencia held a vigil at the ICE facility. The group has also reported that detainees have staged three hunger strikes at the facility so far this year.
More than 160 detainees are currently on a hunger strike, protesting Daniel's death. The detainees are also demanding their immediate release due to months of detention without resolution in their immigration cases, La Resistencia said.
Detainees have long complained of a lack of cleanliness, mistreatment, and other poor conditions, such as finding objects in food. La Resistencia said another detainee had witnessed GEO guards yelling at and mistreating Daniel.
La Resistencia said it will continue to hold daily vigils. The group is also demanding an immediate public response from the Washington State Congressional delegation. a congressional hearing, as well as an independent investigation.
In 2021,Washington state passed a private prison ban and the Northwest ICE Processing Center was expected to close in 2025. But GEO Group sued over the legislation and the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a California law banning private prisons could not apply to federal detention centers.
Last year, Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson conceded that court ruling applies here.
The facility can hold almost 1600 people and detainees can spend months and even years inside as their immigration cases proceed.
