Mexican Judge Orders Five Held on Homicide Charges in Migrant Fire

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A migrant cries leaning on an ambulance as a person she knows is attended by medics after a fire broke out at the Mexican Immigration Detention center in Juarez on Monday, March, 27, 2023. A fire in a dormitory at a Mexican immigration detention center near the U.S. border left more than three dozen migrants dead. It was one of the deadliest incidents ever at an immigration lockup in the country. (Omar Ornelas/The El Paso Times via AP)
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A Venezuelan migrant sits on the sidewalk where an altar was created with candles and photos outside the Mexican immigration detention center that was the site of a deadly fire, as migrants wake up after spending the night on the sidewalk in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Thursday, March 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
A Venezuelan migrant sits on the sidewalk where an altar was created with candles and photos outside the Mexican immigration detention center that was the site of a deadly fire, as migrants wake up after spending the night on the sidewalk in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Thursday, March 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
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MEXICO CITY (AP) — A Mexican judge ordered that three Mexican immigration officials, a private security guard and a Venezuelan migrant be held for investigation in connection with a fire last week at an immigration detention center in northern Mexico that killed 40 migrants.

The four people responsible for security at the Ciudad Juarez facility will be held on charges of homicide by omission and causing injuries, while the migrant who allegedly set the fire faces charges of homicide and causing injuries, Mexico’s Federal Judiciary Council said after Tuesday’s hearing.

A video from a security camera inside the facility shows guards walking away when the fire started last Monday night inside the cell holding migrants and not making any attempt to release them. It was not clear whether those guards had keys to the cell doors.

More than two dozen migrants were seriously injured in the fire.

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