After federal immigration agents in Minneapolis fatally shot Renee Good and Alex Pretti in January 2026, social media users circulated a post claiming that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had killed seven additional people that year, making a total of nine.
A screenshot of the post, originally published on X
The text of the post read:
Much love to Alex Pretti and Renee Good—but remember—ICE has killed 9 people in 2026. You know the names of the 2 white people they've killed. ICE has also killed a Black man named Keith Porter, a Cambodian named Parady La, and five Latinos named Heber Sanchaz Domínguez, Victor Manuel Diaz, Luis Beltran Yanez-Cruz, Luis Gustavo Nunez Caceres, and Geraldo Lunas Campos. ICE is on pace to kill more than 100 people this year. Abolish ICE. Impeach Noem. Prosecute those who committed these crimes.
(Rashid did not immediately return an inquiry as to how he selected these names.)
ICE officers killed at least two of the nine people listed in the above post: Good and Porter, whom an off-duty agent shot
The six other people listed in the post died in ICE custody in 2026. A county medical examiner determined that Lunas Campos died by homicide, which ICE has disputed, and a wrongful-death lawsuit filed by his family is ongoing as of this writing.
While ICE said suicide and health complications caused the remaining deaths, the circumstances behind many of them have sparked allegations of abuse and medical neglect consistent with years of reported poor treatment within ICE facilities. Those allegations came from congressional investigations, federal auditors, journalists, researchers, civil rights groups and detainees.
In an emailed statement, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson claimed that for many detainees, "this is the best healthcare they have received their entire lives," and that the agency has "maintained higher standard of care than most prisons that hold U.S. citizens—including providing access to proper medical care."
"There have been six illegal aliens who have passed away in ICE custody this year, each of them due to natural causes or suicide, NOT at the hands of ICE agents," the agency said in the March 6 statement, using its preferred term for people in the country without legal status. "It is a longstanding practice to provide comprehensive medical care from the moment an alien enters ICE custody. This includes medical, dental, and mental health services as available, and access to medical appointments and 24-hour emergency care."
Between the publication of the above post and the publication of this story, at least five people not named in Rashid's list have died in ICE custody.
The first was a 59-year-old Cambodian man named Lorth Sim, who died Feb. 18, meaning ICE's March 6 statement was out of date by the time the agency sent it. The second, 27-year-old Jairo Garcia-Hernandez from Guatemala, "collapsed unexpectedly" after a history of "severe medical complications," ICE said.
Three people died in March: a 48-year old Mexican national named Alberto Gutiérrez‑Reyes, a 59-year-old Iranian national named Pejman Karshenas Najafabadi and a 56-year-old Haitian man named Emmanuel Damas.
The cause of Sim's death was under investigation. ICE said Gutiérrez‑Reyes, Karshenas and Damas died of health complications, but family and local officials have alleged that Gutiérrez‑Reyes and Damas were denied medical care.
This list does not include other deaths caused by or involving DHS agents outside of ICE, and there may be other, unreported deaths.
Here's what else we know about the circumstances behind the deaths of the seven people in the post who received less news coverage than Good and Pretti:
Porter, a 43-year-old father of two, was fatally shot an off-duty ICE officer after a confrontation outside an apartment complex in Los Angeles where both Porter and the agent lived. The shooting reportedly took place shortly before midnight on New Year's Eve 2025; the earliest news coverage of the death we found appeared on Jan. 1, 2026, which may explain why Rashid included him in the list.
Porter's lawyer claims he was firing his rifle into the air in celebration of the new year when the agent approached him. The Department of Homeland Security claims its officer, later identified by the Los Angeles Times as Brian Palacios, responded to an "active shooter" situation and fired "defensively." The officer left the incident unharmed.
The Los Angeles Police Department is leading an
Porter's lawyers did not return a request for more information.
Geraldo Lunas Campos
Lunas Campos, a 55-year-old from Cuba, died Jan. 3 at Camp East Montana in Texas after experiencing what ICE called "medical distress." The El Paso County medical examiner's office classified his death as a homicide via oxygen deprivation, according to court documents.
Medical examiner findings are not legally binding, and it was not clear whether criminal charges would be filed in this incident. However, Lunas Campos' family has filed a wrongful-death lawsuit. According to the complaint, witnesses to Lunas Campos' death swore under penalty of perjury that the detention facility's guards denied him asthma medication, "handcuffed him, shackled him, and forced him into a solitary confinement cell, after which Mr. Lunas Campos repeatedly stated that he could not breathe and was being asphyxiated."
Witness testimony disputed ICE's claims that Lunas Campos was disruptive. For example, here's an excerpt from pages 7 and 8 of a sworn declaration from Santos Jesus Flores, one of two witnesses who also spoke with The Washington Post:
There was no reason for the guards to have thrown Geraldo into his cell or hurt him. He was not trying to injure any guards, and he was not trying to injure himself. He was not encouraging anyone else in the unit to do anything, and he was not trying to destroy any property in the facility. All he wanted was his medicine that he needed for his asthma.
[…]
I am scared knowing what happened to Geraldo. But I know that what happened to Geraldo is an injustice and that when there is an injustice, we have to speak up.
DHS spokespeople have reportedly offered conflicting claims about Lunas Campos' death. ICE's death report for Lunas Campos claimed he attempted "self-harm."
Victor Manuel Diaz
Diaz, a 36-year-old from Nicaragua, died in what ICE called a "presumed suicide," on Jan. 14, 2026, also at Camp East Montana. ICE provided no details about how Diaz was found, other than "unconscious and unresponsive."
According to The Associated Press, a report from El Paso's emergency medical services said Diaz was suspected of hanging himself with a bedsheet. Diaz's body was sent to William Beaumont Army Medical Center in Fort Bliss, rather than the county medical examiner, which Randall
Kallinen told Snopes in a phone call that the family does not believe Diaz died by suicide because he was not depressed, he was being deported to Nicaragua — where his entire family was — and because
Parady La
La, a 46-year-old Cambodian national, "was found unresponsive in his cell" on Jan. 7, 2026 — the day after his arrest, according to an ICE news release. At the time, La was "receiving treatment for severe drug withdrawal," according to ICE.
ICE's death notice said La died at a hospital in Philadelphia after experiencing numerous health complications, including brain injury, post cardiac arrest, shock and multiple organ failures. But La's family has reportedly questioned his medical care while in ICE custody and said he did not receive proper care for drug withdrawal, according to Philadelphia news station WPVI.
La was a refugee who obtained legal immigration status before losing it due to criminal convictions, some of which his family reportedly said were tied to his struggles with addiction.
La's family has reportedly set up a GoFundMe, and, per the fundraiser, the family is preparing to file a lawsuit over his death. (Snopes has not
Heber
Sanchaz (or Sanchez, in some sources) Domínguez, a 34-year-old from Mexico, died at Georgia's Robert A. Deyton Detention Center on Jan. 14, 2026. Medical staff found him "hanging by the neck and unresponsive in his sleeping quarters," according to an ICE news release. ICE said he showed no signs of distress during the intake process.
ICE has not released any results of the investigation into his death that the agency said is ongoing. The
Attempts to reach Sanchaz Domínguez's family through a
Luis Beltrán Yanez-Cruz
Yanez-Cruz, a 68-year-old from Honduras, died in ICE custody on Jan. 6 at a hospital in California "after being admitted for heart-related health issues," according to ICE.
A report from the LA Times said his daughter,
"My heart still can't grasp what they did to my dad, because he was a healthy man, without any medical conditions. He just arrived at that cursed place and started getting sick," she reportedly told El País, a reputable newspaper based in Spain.
The agency's death report for Yanez-Cruz also says he initially did not report any chronic medical conditions but later suffered "five cardiac arrests" despite "intensive treatment."
Attempts to reach Yanez-Cruz's loved ones through a GoFundMe (archived) set up for his family went unanswered.
Núñez Cáceres, a 42-year-old from Honduras, died Jan. 5 at a hospital in Texas while in ICE custody. ICE said he was admitted to HCA Houston Healthcare on Dec. 23, 2025, for "complications related to congenital heart failure."
"On Dec. 31, 2025, he suffered multiple life-threatening medical emergencies, and HCA medical personnel moved him to the intensive care unit, where he remained until his death," ICE's death notice said.
Núñez Cáceres' brother, Marvin Núñez, appeared to have set up a GoFundMe (archived) page requesting assistance in bringing his brother's body home. The page read, in Spanish (translated by a Snopes reporter):
My brother was a person full of life and hope, always fighting for his wellbeing and that of our family. Sadly, his life was cut short due to the lack of adequate medical attention while he was in ICE custody.
Attempts to reach Núñez Cáceres' family via the GoFundMe went unanswered.
Snopes reporter Anna Rascouët-Paz contributed to this report.