The numbers tell a story that federal officials have spent years trying to obscure. At least 37 people have died in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody or during enforcement operations this year, making 2026 the deadliest fiscal year on record for the agency. But the death toll is only the most visible symptom of a deeper institutional failure.

A comprehensive review of government data, whistleblower disclosures, and independent investigations reveals an agency that operates with minimal accountability, detains overwhelmingly non-violent individuals, and routinely violates its own policies and federal court orders. The question is no longer whether ICE can be reformed—it is whether the agency should exist at all.

The data on who ICE actually detains dismantles the agency's central justification. According to an ABC News analysis of government data covering the first 14 months of the current administration, only 3% of individuals detained by ICE had a violent felony conviction. Out of 438,537 people detained between January 2025 and March 2026, just 13,018 had convictions for violent crimes like homicide, sexual assault, robbery, or aggravated assault.

Meanwhile, 70.6% of detainees have no criminal conviction at all, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. An additional 20% to 26% have pending charges but have not been convicted of any crime. The overwhelming majority of people in ICE custody are held for civil immigration violations—administrative infractions, not violent offenses.

The Deadliest Year on Record

The 37 deaths in ICE custody and operations this year represent more than double the mortality rate of previous years. According to KFF, the number of deaths among people in ICE custody increased from 11 in 2024 and fewer than ten in earlier years. The surge coincides with a massive expansion of detention capacity and a corresponding deterioration in conditions.

Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union have documented a pattern of preventable deaths linked to delayed or inadequate medical care, unmanaged drug and alcohol withdrawal, and a significant uptick in suicides tied to deteriorating facility conditions and prolonged isolation. The detained population has surged past 70,000, far exceeding the system's capacity to provide basic medical and mental health care.

"The mortality rate has more than doubled," the ACLU noted in a recent report. "Independent medical reviews have linked these deaths to severe medical neglect, delays in diagnosing and treating life-threatening infections, sepsis, and heart conditions."

The true toll may be even higher. The Trump administration rescinded a June requirement that ICE report and investigate deaths occurring within 30 days of an individual's release from custody. Human rights groups point to "deathbed releases"—the practice of freeing detainees who are near death so their deaths do not appear in official ICE custody statistics.

Tactical Failures in Communities

The deaths in detention facilities are compounded by an escalating pattern of violence during street operations. This week's shooting of Oscar Belgal in the Marble Hill neighborhood of New York City—in which plainclothes ICE agents wearing construction vests fired seven rounds into a vehicle containing a 5-year-old child—has become the latest flashpoint in a national debate over ICE's tactics.

New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch confirmed that the NYPD reviewed city surveillance footage showing Belgal backing into a parking space when a plainclothes federal agent approached his driver-side window with a gun drawn. A second agent moved toward the car's headlight. The video shows the vehicle begin to move forward but immediately leaves the camera's frame before the shooting occurs. The city's cameras did not capture whether the car actively targeted the agents.

Federal officials claim Belgal "weaponized his vehicle," rammed two government vehicles, and drove toward agents. But the unreleased body camera footage—which DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin confirmed exists—has not been made public. Journalists and legal teams from Reuters have noted that past ICE incident reports have sometimes been contradicted once video evidence surfaces.

Who ICE Actually Targets

The Belgal case illustrates a broader pattern: an agency that deploys military-style tactics against individuals with no history of violent crime. According to New York court records, Belgal's actual legal record in the city consists of two prior arrests—a 2023 robbery/grand larceny charge that was reduced to fourth-degree grand larceny (a non-violent theft charge) with a sentence of five years probation, and a pending 2025 drug sale case to which he has pleaded not guilty.

Federal authorities labeled him a "thug" and a violent gang member with ties to the Trinitarios transnational gang. But local officials and immigration advocates argue that his documented record does not show a history of violent offenses that would justify a high-stakes, armed confrontation on a public street with a child in the vehicle.

• 3% of ICE detainees have a violent felony conviction, according to ABC News analysis of government data
• 70.6% of detainees have no criminal conviction at all, per Syracuse University's TRAC
• 37 deaths in ICE custody or operations this year—the deadliest fiscal year on record
• 16 weeks of training at the ICE Academy, compared to 6 months for NYPD and 20 weeks for the FBI
• 70,000+ people currently in ICE detention, far exceeding capacity

A Training and Accountability Deficit

There's a fundamental mismatch between ICE's mission and its training. ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations officers receive 16 weeks of training at the ICE Academy in Glynco, Georgia—significantly less than the 6 months required for major city police departments and the 20 weeks for FBI agents.

More critically, while local police departments across the country have heavily restricted firing at moving vehicles because it is highly unpredictable and puts bystanders at risk, ICE guidelines grant agents wider discretion to fire if they claim a vehicle is being used as a weapon. Many major metropolitan police departments, including the NYPD, strictly ban or discourage officers from firing at moving vehicles.

The agency's use of plainclothes agents, masks, and tactical deception—including agents disguised as construction workers—has been widely criticized as inherently escalatory. When masked individuals surround a car with guns drawn on a city street, a driver's natural instinct is panic or flight, assuming they are being carjacked or assaulted.

The Case for Abolition

The evidence of systemic failure is overwhelming. An agency that detains overwhelmingly non-violent individuals, that has presided over the deadliest year in its history, that operates with minimal accountability and inadequate training, and that routinely escalates routine civil encounters into lethal confrontations cannot be reformed from within.

The 37 deaths this year are not anomalies. They are the predictable result of a system that treats civil immigration violations as criminal threats, that prioritizes enforcement statistics over human life, and that operates with near-total impunity. The deathbed release policy—designed to keep official statistics lower—reveals an agency more concerned with appearances than with the lives in its custody.

Immigration enforcement is fundamentally an administrative and civil process. Being undocumented is a civil infraction, not a violent crime. The functions currently performed by ICE—processing deportation orders, managing immigration courts, facilitating voluntary departures—could be absorbed by other agencies or reconstituted under a framework that prioritizes due process, community safety, and human dignity over tactical dominance.

The question is not whether ICE can be improved. It is whether an agency with this record—this death toll, this pattern of violence, this disregard for accountability—deserves to exist at all.