Second child dies in US custody

An 8-year-old boy from Guatemala died in government custody in New Mexico early yesterday, US immigration authorities said, marking the second death of an immigrant child in detention this month.

The death came during an ongoing dispute over border security and with a partial government shutdown under way over President Donald Trump’s request for border wall funding.

US Customs and Border Protection said the boy showed ‘‘signs of potential illness’’ on Tuesday and was taken with his father to a hospital in Alamogordo, New Mexico, where he was diagnosed with a cold and a fever. The boy was prescribed amoxicillin and Ibuprofen and released that afternoon after being held for 90 minutes for observation, the agency said. The boy was returned to the hospital that evening with nausea and vomiting and died there just after midnight, CBP said.

CBP has not yet confirmed when or where the father and son entered the United States or how long they were detained, saying only in its statement that the boy had been ‘‘previously apprehended’’ by its agents.

The agency said the cause of the boy’s death has not been determined and that it has notified the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general and the Guatemalan government.

A 7-year-old Guatemalan girl died earlier this month after being apprehended by border agents in New Mexico. The body of the girl, Jakelin Caal, was returned to her family’s remote village on Tuesday for burial yesterday.

The White House referred questions about the latest case to the US Department of Homeland Security, CBP’s parent agency. CBP officers and the Border Patrol remain on the job despite the shutdown.

According to Guatemala’s foreign ministry, the father and son entered the US at El Paso, Texas, on December 18, then were taken to the Border Patrol’s Alamogordo station on Monday. Alamogordo is about 145 kilometres from El Paso.

CBP typically detains immigrants for no more than a few days when they cross the border before either releasing them or turning them over to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement for longer-term detention.

Agency guidelines say immigrants generally shouldn’t be detained for more than 72 hours in CBP holding facilities, which are usually smaller and have fewer services than ICE’s detention centres.

Parents and children together are almost always released quickly due to limited space in ICE’s family detention facilities.

–AP

AP Domingo Caal, back centre, attends a memorial service for his 7-year-old granddaughter Jakelin Caal, in San Antonio Secortez, Guatemala. The body of the 7-year-old girl who died while in the custody of the US Border Patrol was handed over to family members in her native Guatemala on Tuesday. Yesterday another Guatemalan child died while in US custody.