52nd Immigrant Death in ICE Custody During Trump's Second Term

Mamuka Artmeladze, a 43-year-old Georgian immigrant, was found unconscious in his cell at the Winn Correctional Center in Winnfield, Louisiana, on the evening of June 4th. Staff discovered him at 10:37 p.m., declared a medical emergency, and began resuscitation efforts. An ambulance transported him to Winn Parish Medical Center, where doctors continued attempting to revive him for nearly 45 minutes. At 11:22 p.m., a physician pronounced him dead. The cause remains undetermined pending autopsy results.

Artmeladze's death marks the 52nd recorded fatality of an immigrant held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody since President Donald Trump took office in January 2025. He had been detained at the facility for approximately four months. According to ICE records, he entered the United States illegally in September 2022 and was apprehended by Border Patrol, then released on conditional status with instructions to report to ICE within 60 days. He failed to appear. In February 2026, an ICE enforcement operation targeting commercial vehicle drivers near Fackler, Alabama, located and detained him after determining he had no legal status to remain in the country.

The death at Winn is the second in less than two months at that location. In April, Alejandro Cabrera Clemente, a 49-year-old Mexican national, was found unresponsive during a security check and died after being transported to the same hospital. A medical examiner determined Cabrera died of natural causes—cardiovascular disease. According to facility records, Cabrera had awakened coughing and wheezing roughly two and a half hours before staff found him unconscious with facial drooping and discolored skin indicating low oxygen levels. He had been receiving treatment for hypertension and other health conditions during his detention.

The Winn facility, operated jointly by the Winn Parish Sheriff's Office and the private contractor LaSalle Corrections, houses more than 1,500 male detainees. The majority, like Artmeladze, have no criminal records. Yet a surprise inspection by the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General, released last week, documented serious deficiencies. Inspectors found water leaking through ventilation grates in the kitchen, holes and exposed insulation in the admission building's ceiling, and food stored in freezers above required temperatures. Medical staff failed to maintain current treatment documentation and laboratory test records—gaps that the report warned could "negatively affect the medical care and safety of detainees." The inspection also uncovered violations of force policies: one officer applied a prohibited chokehold to a detainee, and another drove a pen into a detainee's thumb after he refused to remove his hand from a doorway. ICE agreed to nine recommendations for improvement and stated it had already implemented several.

ICE maintains that detainees receive comprehensive medical care from arrival onward, including medical, dental, and mental health screenings within 12 hours, full health evaluations within 14 days, access to appointments, and 24-hour emergency care. The agency states that emergency treatment is never withheld. Yet the mounting death toll tells a different story. Through June 9, 2026, 19 immigrants have died in ICE custody this year alone. During the final year of the Biden administration, 11 detainees died in ICE custody—a figure that has already been nearly doubled in the first five months of Trump's second term.

The deaths have intensified scrutiny of whether detention centers are providing adequate medical oversight and humane conditions. Advocates point to the pattern of preventable deaths, the documented failures in medical record-keeping, and the use-of-force violations as evidence of systemic neglect. ICE disputes these characterizations, insisting that its facilities meet required standards and that deaths result from medical emergencies beyond the agency's control. The gap between these claims and the inspection findings—not to mention the accelerating death count—leaves the question of accountability unresolved.