Advocates: Immigrant child died after leaving ICE custody

HOUSTON — A report that a child died shortly after being released from a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Texas inflamed the debate Wednesday over the detention of immigrant families, though there were few details about what happened.

The American Immigration Lawyers Association said it had learned of the death of a child shortly after the child and parent left the ICE family detention center at Dilley, Texas. The legal group said it was made aware of the death through someone in contact with the family it could not identify, and that it had no further details.

ICE spokeswoman Jennifer Elzea said that the agency would investigate the report, “but without any specifics about who this was we are unable to provide anything further at this time.” ICE denied that a child died at the detention center.

The story began to spread after Houston-based lawyer Mana Yegani tweeted Tuesday night that she had heard reports “that a child died in ICE custody in Dilley, Texas.” Yegani then followed up to say she heard the child had actually died after leaving Dilley. She would delete her original tweet.

But her initial report was widely shared and discussed on social media, reflecting the impassioned nature of the debate over immigrant children and the separation of families at the bor- der under the Trump administration’s zero-tolerance policy.

Yegani said Wednesday that she based her tweets off a Facebook post written by another lawyer, Melissa Turcios.

Turcios, based in Washington, confirmed to The Associated Press that she wrote the Facebook post Yegani saw, but declined to comment further.