Man seeking asylum dies after untreated tooth infection in Arizona ICE detention center

A Haitian man seeking asylum and held at a Florence detention center became the tenth person to die in 2026 while in the custody of U.S. immigration officials. The man died on Monday at a Scottsdale hospital after complaining of an untreated tooth infection that had been worsening since mid-February, an Arizona politician said Tuesday.

Emmanuel Damas had been in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement since officers detained him in Boston in September, according to Chandler Councilwoman Christine Ellis, a Haitian immigrant and the first Black woman to serve on the council.

Courtesy of Councilwoman Christine Ellis via Emmanuel Damas' family

"His reported struggle to receive timely medical attention before being transferred to a hospital raises serious and painful concerns about the quality of care provided to individuals in custody," Ellis, a registered nurse, said Tuesday, citing conversations with his family.

Ellis shared an Instagram post showing Damas smiling in a gray shirt and tie, as well as a photo of him intubated in a hospital bed with his bare chest covered in medical intravenous lines.

The Arizona Daily Star first reported Damas' death. ICE officials in Arizona did not immediately respond to Arizona Luminaria's request for additional information about Damas' death.

Since the start of January, at least 10 people have died while in ICE custody, according to an online database maintained by longtime immigration researcher Austin Kocher. His database lists the deaths of three other people held at Arizona detention centers since President Donald Trump began his second term last year.

"A toothache should not be a death sentence,” Arizona Rep. Adelita Grijalva said in a statement Wednesday. She made her first oversight visit as a congresswoman to two detention centers in Eloy and Florence last week and met with some people detained at the facility.

"Emmanuel Damas should be alive today," Grijalva added. "These are mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters — people dying from simple, treatable ailments because they are being treated as less than human."

Laura St. John, legal director for the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project, said in a statement Wednesday that they have long documented the lack of constitutionally-required medical care at immigration detention facilities in Arizona.

"ICE routinely refuses dental care to people until they have been in custody for six months, and that clock typically resets each time someone is transferred," St. John said. "Every person deserves appropriate medical and dental care, and we are deeply troubled by the reports of what Mr. Damas endured leading to his passing."

This article first appeared on AZ Luminaria and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.