Hundreds of people gathered Saturday for the burial of a young Mexican man who died in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, with family members denouncing the “fabricated” charges that led to his detention and death.
Royer Perez Jimenez, a 19-year-old from the municipality of San Juan Chamula in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas, died on March 16 at a detention center in Florida.
After the family received his body on Thursday, his uncle Manuel Perez said Royer was a “hard worker” who immigrated at 15 to “triumph and help his family.”
He was arrested in January on suspicion of resisting arrest and giving a false identity to law enforcement, but Perez insists he was confused because he was not fluent in English.
“He was unjustly accused as a criminal… they fabricated a crime,” Perez told AFP, while also expressing the family’s doubts about the circumstances of his death.
ICE officials said Royer died of an apparent suicide but the official cause of death remained under investigation.
“What we want is a thorough investigation because unfortunately we do not believe suicide was the cause of his death, rather we suspect it was probably a homicide,” Perez said.
At least 14 migrants of various nationalities have died in ICE custody in 2026, according to officials, amid President Donald Trump‘s ongoing immigration crackdown.
There have been 14 Mexican nationals who have died after contact with US immigration authorities since Trump began his second term in January 2025.
