User:Madeline Allleft/The death of Victoria Arellano

The death of Victoria Arellano, a Mexican immigrant in the United States, occurred on July 20, 2007, while under the custody of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Events
Victoria Arellano died from complications of HIV/AIDS. While ICE officials refused to comment on Arellano's death, immigrant advocates, AIDS patients, and the LGBT community have denounced the lack of medical care as unfair and discriminatory.

Victoria Arellano was born in Guadalajara on October 10, 1983. She migrated to the United States as a child. She was a transgender woman who was categorized as male at birth.

After contracting HIV, she was prescribed bactrim and later switched to dapsone. Both medications were daily antibiotics. Three years before being detained, doctors from a free clinic in Los Angeles described her as "asymptomatic." Her condition began to deteriorate in May 2007, when, after being detected entering the country illegally for the second time, she was detained at a center in San Pedro, California, where she was denied her medications and medical attention.

Arellano was cared for by other detainees at the center, who took turns assisting her to the bathroom and bringing her fresh towels. She was transferred to the infirmary on July 13, 2007, and was prescribed amoxicillin. She could not hold down the medication and began vomiting blood.

Eighty detainees protested the denial of her treatment, chanting "Hospital" and ignoring an order to line up for the nightly count. She was transported to a hospital in San Pedro but was returned to the facility within twenty-four hours. Once again, she was weakened by vomiting and diarrhea, and was again transported to the hospital, this time to the intensive care unit of Little Company of Mary Hospital in San Pedro. She was handcuffed to her bed, and her door was guarded by two immigration agents. She died on July 20, 2007.