An illegal immigrant from Mexico who was being held for deportation died in custody Saturday, and border officials say it appears he took his own life.
Homeland Security released only scant information, saying the 42-year-old man had shown up at the border crossing in Hidalgo, Texas, on Friday and falsely claimed to be a U.S. citizen.
He was arrested and was being held for both deportation and for criminal prosecution for lying, Customs and Border Protection officials said. He died the next day.
“According to initial reports, the cause of death is suspected to be the result of suicide,” CBP said.
The pace of illegal immigration from Mexico has ticked up in recent months as the smuggling cartels look for new customers, now that the Trump administration has managed to find ways to deter the Central American families who surged to the border earlier this year.
Those families were particularly tough cases for border officials, who lacked facilities to house them and who were so overwhelmed by the numbers they barely had time to process the migrants before having to release them.
Reports of the deaths of children in CBP custody shook the Homeland Security Department over the last year, forcing Homeland Security to deploy hundreds of additional medical workers to try to ease the situation.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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