At least 6 suicide attempts this year at Tacoma ICE detention center, 911 calls show

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At least six suicide attempts occurred at a federal, privately-owned immigration detention center in Tacoma over less than three months this year, according to Pierce County 911 call records. 

The call logs, obtained by the University of Washington Center for Human Rights through a public records request, cover 911 calls made from the Northwest ICE Processing Center, also known as the Northwest Detention Center, from Jan. 1 to March 18, 2024. The researchers released their findings on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, during a congressional hearing on Wednesday, Washington U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, a Democrat, pressed Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas “to commit to an independent investigation conducted by an entity outside of the department to inspect the conditions and practices” at the Tacoma facility.

Mayorkas said he’d be “pleased to consider that” and that the department has a new leader of the Office of the Detention Ombudsman who he said would be capable of conducting the review.

In six of the 911 calls, the callers identify attempts at hanging or asphyxiation using materials like blankets, socks and trash bags. Two of the calls appear to involve the same person. Five of the six attempts happened in March. Four attempts happened on March 11 and 13; each day a  911 call was made saw two attempts. 

In one call, a facility nurse tells the dispatcher that a 28-year-old woman who tried to asphyxiate herself had attempted suicide a few days earlier, suggesting a seventh attempt not documented in the 911 calls. 

The findings come a little over a month after 61-year-old Charles Leo Daniel died at the facility in what activists believe was a suicide while Daniel was detained in solitary confinement. Tacoma police say there is no known cause of death and neither U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement or the Pierce County Medical Examiner’s Office has released a cause of death. 

UW researchers have requested detailed call records reporting Daniel’s death but have yet to receive them. 

In one of the March 13 calls, the detention center staff request a medical response for a suicide attempt. “We need medical here immediately,” the caller says. In a follow-up call less than 15 minutes later, facility staff tell Tacoma police that the incident is being handled “in-house” and does not require police response. It’s unclear if emergency responders arrived. 

Activists allege The GEO Group, which runs the facility, is attempting to handle medical emergencies without police response to hide how often medical emergencies and suicide attempts are happening inside the facility. GEO says they “reject these politically motivated and baseless allegations” and said medical care at the facility is provided through ICE Health Services Corps. 

“These recordings show a total disregard of the lives of people in detention,” said Maru Mora Villalpando, who heads La Resistencia, a group calling for the facility’s closure. 

Suicide attempts possibly on the rise

Northwest ICE Processing Center has long been under scrutiny for hundreds of reported human rights violations, including inadequate food, poor hygiene, medical neglect and misuse of solitary confinement. 

But UW researchers say there is evidence the rate of reported suicide attempts has increased over past years. In 911 calls obtained through prior research, twelve incidents from Aug. 10, 2017 to April 3, 2023 were categorized as suicide attempts by the dispatch center. 

However, researchers caution there may be even more suicide attempts that were categorized as “medical incidents.” 

One call on March 13, separate from the six documented attempts, may also point to another possible suicide: A man either jumped or fell from the upper tier of the building, which the caller estimates is an eight-foot drop.

A man released from the facility on Wednesday, Rahmunullah Shinwari, said he witnessed a man jump from the second floor and break his leg during his time there.

Shinwari, a 39-year-old Afghan pediatrician who was in the facility for a month, believes the man who jumped was attempting suicide. He said many detainees had mental health issues, and GEO saw detainees as property, rather than people. 

“A lot of people tried to [die by] suicide,” Shinwari said. 

The last confirmed death by suicide at the facility was in 2018, when Mergensana Amar, a 40-year-old Russian asylum-seeker, died following a hanging attempt while detained in solitary confinement.

Calls for an investigation

On March 29, a dozen U.S. senators, including Murray and fellow Washington Democrat Sen. Maria Cantwell, sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security calling on ICE to limit its use of solitary confinement and demanding release of additional information regarding ICE’s use of solitary confinement by April 5. 

Daniel, the detainee who died, was in solitary confinement for nearly all four years of his time at Northwest ICE Processing Center despite receiving a final deportation order in December 2020, according to UW researchers. 

Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington also criticized ICE and said she plans to send DHS a letter. The senators have not received answers yet from either DHS or ICE, Murray’s office said. 

Mayorkas told Murray during the hearing on Wednesday that he is reviewing how solitary confinement is used in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities and needed about three weeks to provide her with a “full report on the path ahead.” The homeland security secretary is on the cusp of facing an impeachment trial in the Senate, which Murray is expected to preside over. 

Cantwell and Jayapal have also said there should be an investigation into the Tacoma facility’s alleged misuse of solitary confinement. 

Villalpando said she wants the senators to visit the facility and meet with those who have attempted suicide and those who have claimed medical neglect. 

“We’ve seen an increase of people trying to attempt suicide telling us ‘I’d rather die than continue being detained in here,’” said Villalpando, who stays in close contact with detainees. “That’s a quote. I’m not making this up. We have heard people telling us that again and again.”