On the morning of March 13, Afghan immigrant Mohammad Nazeer Paktiawal was taken into custody while preparing to take his children to school. His wife told Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents that Paktiawal required an inhaler to breathe. She said officers did not take the inhaler and did not allow her to provide it later. Within 24 hours, the former Afghan National Army Special Operations Command soldier was dead.
Paktiawal began to experience shortness of breath shortly after arriving at an ICE detention center. When he called his brother, Naseer Paktiawal, to alert him to his condition, his brother reported a medical emergency at the detention center. Paktiawal was taken to Parkland Hospital at 11:30 p.m. He was stabilized, but began to experience swelling of his tongue as he ate breakfast. He died forty minutes later, around 9 a.m. His family was not alerted to his death until noon.
