News · Migration
A Cuban man from Hialeah with terminal cancer dies after ICE released him two days earlier, Miami Herald reports
Gustavo Rivero Napoles, a 65-year-old Cuban who lived in Hialeah, died on October 25 in the intensive care unit of a California hospital after some five months in ICE detention; the agency processed his release 48 hours before his death.
Gustavo Rivero Napoles, a 65-year-old Cuban man, died on Sunday, October 25, in the intensive care unit of Adventist Health Tehachapi Valley Medical Center in California after nearly five months in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), according to a Miami Herald investigation published on October 30 and reported by Periódico Cubano. He had terminal liver cancer and left immigration custody through an administrative release 48 hours before he died, when, his relatives say, he was already unconscious.
Rivero Napoles had come to the United States from Cuba as a child and lived for decades in Hialeah, Florida. He was a permanent resident and used a wheelchair because of complications from stage four liver cancer. According to his sister Carolina Rivero, he was being held after breaching the conditions of his parole, and in June a judge authorized his release on humanitarian grounds so he could spend the final stage of his illness with his family, but immigration officers took custody of him before he walked free.
He was held first in Florida and then at the California City detention centre, where his condition worsened. From there he called relatives asking for help: according to his sister's account, he was in severe pain and reported difficulty getting the medication he needed. On October 20 he was admitted to hospital, three days later he was moved to intensive care and ICE processed his release. On the corresponding document, an official recorded that the patient refused to sign, even though his relatives say he was in no condition to do so.
"They just discarded him. They only waited for him to die," said Carolina Rivero, in remarks published in Spanish by Periódico Cubano, blaming immigration authorities and detention centre staff for what she described as medical neglect. Relatives described difficulties locating him and learning his clinical state, and said that after his death they received a call from ICE about an immigration appointment scheduled for November. According to the Miami Herald, when the family reported the death, the agency did not know of it and asked where it had happened. ICE has not commented publicly on the case.
In June 2026, ICE amended the rules that required reporting and investigating deaths occurring within 30 days of a detainee's release. The previous rules sought to prevent gravely ill people from being left out of official records through releases shortly before death, according to Periódico Cubano.
Counts of deaths in custody differ depending on the period measured. The Miami Herald puts at more than 30 the people who died in 2025 and at least 29 those in 2026, above any year in the past two decades. Periódico Cubano, for its part, puts deaths in fiscal year 2026 at 37, the highest figure since the agency was created in 2003.
Sources: Periódico Cubano · Miami Herald (vía Yahoo News)
Data updated: 2026-11-01T16:15:00.000Z