Medical examiner rules Haitian asylum seeker's death in Pittsburgh a homicide

Daphy Michel was released from federal immigration custody in Pittsburgh on February 27, with an ankle monitor, a fully charged phone and her belongings. Three days later, the 31-year-old Haitian asylum seeker was found at a bus shelter near Station Square and died of hypothermia, and Allegheny County medical examiners have now ruled her death a homicide.

The ruling does not by itself assign criminal guilt, but it sharply elevates the question of what duty of care U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had once Michel was back on the street. The medical examiner said Michel was a vulnerable adult suffering from untreated severe mental health issues and a significant language barrier, circumstances that make her release and supervision central to the accountability debate.

Michel’s family attorney, Joseph Patrick Murphy, said she arrived at the southern border in 2022 and was granted humanitarian parole based on urgent humanitarian need. He said she had a hearing scheduled for two weeks after her death. Murphy also said Michel had been arrested after a psychiatric episode in which she was yelling at imaginary people, then spent six months in Washington County Jail before her case was dismissed and ICE took her to Pittsburgh.

CBS Pittsburgh reported that Michel was found on March 1 near Station Square, taken to a hospital, and died the next day. PublicSource reported that ICE took her from Washington County Jail without notifying her family, a detail that intensifies questions about whether there was any coordinated handoff to shelter, family support or mental-health care after her release.

Department of Homeland Security Acting Secretary Lauren Bis said ICE had “nothing” to do with Michel’s death and argued that she was released in sunny weather, in the middle of Pittsburgh, with public transportation available. DHS also said ICE later learned that her ankle monitor had been tampered with. Murphy said the family expects to sue ICE, and he argued that the homicide finding implies “some sort of culpability.”

Michel’s death is also landing amid wider scrutiny of the federal detention system. ABC News reported that 45 people had died in government custody by March 29 under the current Trump administration, and the Associated Press reported at least 10 ICE detainees had died by suicide since January 2025. Michel’s case now sits at the intersection of immigration enforcement, mental-health neglect and the gaps that can turn a release into a fatal abandonment.