State-Journal.com - Family gets second autopsy in jail death

While waiting for state autopsy results, the family of Ana Romero is getting a second opinion on the cause of her death.

The 44-year-old Romero " a Salvadoran immigrant being held at the Franklin County Regional Jail " died Aug. 21 while waiting for deportation.

State police are investigating her death as a suspected suicide but are awaiting autopsy results from the state medical examiner's office in Frankfort.
Meanwhile, Dr. George Nichols II, a former chief medical examiner for the state, is examining Romero's body in Louisville as well, according to Shelbyville attorney Matthew Pippin, representing Romero's family.

"Just like everybody else at this point, we're waiting for answers," said Pippin on Thursday. "We're making some steps right now because there is a grieving family that wants to bury their loved one.

"There's a second opinion to be gotten. We would like to go ahead and get it and be prepared to allow this family to pay their last respects to their loved one. We are just waiting and want answers however we can get them. Hopefully someone will step up and provide definitive answers here very soon."

Pippin said the family expected to get state preliminary autopsy results by Aug. 29.

"But we still haven't heard anything," said Pippin on Thursday evening at Marimba's Mexican Restaurant, of which Romero's brother-in-law, Mario Aguilar, is a co-owner in Shelbyville.

Pippin said Franklin County Coroner Will Harrod told him Romero was found Aug. 21 with a sheet around her neck.

"I'm not a doctor so I don't understand how much time it takes to diagnose a cause of death by hanging," Pippin said. "If there is some complication and more time is needed, we just want to know so we have a reason for waiting.

"At this point, any answers at all about what caused her to die would be incredibly helpful."

Pippin said getting a second opinion "absolutely does not mean" the family doesn't have confidence in the state's examination of Romero's body.

"Time is an issue because we have a family who would like to bury a loved one."
Romero's sister and brother-in-law, Blanca and Mario Aguilar, said they found the news of her death shocking, especially hearing police suspect that she committed suicide.

Mario Aguilar said Romero was looking forward to returning to San Salvador to see her two sons, 26 and 28, and elderly mother.

He said they talked frequently with Romero by phone and she had called on Aug. 18 complaining of stomach pain and vomiting. He said a female jail employee got on the phone and asked him to encourage his sister-in-law to eat.

"But (Romero) said the food stinks and there was something wrong with it," Mario Aguilar said. "She was crying because she had a stomach ache."

Romero told her family by phone she was placed in a dark, isolated room for refusing to eat, Mario Aguilar said.

He said she had lost 30 to 35 pounds in the Franklin County Jail because she did not want to eat the food.

Pippin said the family wants to know why Romero was placed in an isolation room.
"An isolation room in a jail is used as either punishment or protection," Pippin said. "In phone calls to her family, she had never indicated she had trouble with any other inmates. There are lots of stories to be told by jail records."

Mario Aguilar said Romero was sad because she didn't understand the deportation delay, but she was not suicidal, he said.

Pippin said Romero was a devout Catholic and her family believes her religious convictions would have prevented her from committing suicide.

Mario Aguilar also said Romero had high blood pressure and when she was first transferred to the Franklin County Jail, she had trouble getting her blood pressure medicine.

Franklin County Coroner Will Harrod said last week the final autopsy report could take four to six weeks to receive. Harrod said Romero was pronounced dead at Frankfort Regional Medical Center and he didn't go to the jail, but the state police did.

Last week Franklin County Jailer Billy Roberts declined to release details of her death other than to say it was being investigated by state police as a suspected suicide.

"I'm tore up about this," Roberts said. "My staff did everything they could to try to save her. It's just a very unfortunate circumstance and I feel for her family."

Roberts said 911 was called around 11:15 p.m. on Aug. 21 and emergency medical personnel took Romero to the hospital. Roberts said she died just before midnight.

When asked Thursday by The State Journal if there was anything else he could say about the case, Roberts said, "At this time I don't want to make any more comments until we get some more details on the investigation."

Trooper Ron Turley, spokesman for the state police, said Thursday it's being investigated as a suicide. But like any death investigation, the case won't be closed until the coroner and autopsy reports are received, Turley said.

Romero, who came to Kentucky from El Salvador three years ago, worked in Shelbyville cleaning houses to support her 92-year-old mother and two sons in San Salvador.

On Oct. 13, 2005, immigration officials ordered Romero to leave the country within 90 days, according to court records. But she did not leave.

She was arrested on Jan. 14 by state police after giving federal immigration officials a false identification card, Pippin said. She was charged with criminal possession of a forged instrument.

Mario Aguilar said officers were looking for another suspect when they knocked on Romero's door.

She was held in the Shelby County Jail for four months before being transferred to the Franklin County Jail.

The New York Times recently reported that at least 71 people set for deportation died in custody from 2004 to May 2008. Advocates are now calling for improved health care and suicide prevention measures for the detainees.

"The silence surrounding deaths of immigrants awaiting deportation is notorious, so much so that Congress is demanding more information," said the Rev. Patrick Delahanty, interim director of the Catholic Conference of Kentucky, in a statement Thursday.

"We don't understand why state and county officials have not been responsive to requests for information by reporters.

"Sinceofficials have not been forthcoming with the facts, it appearsthe state police may have charged her criminally for providing false ID to immigration officers. Thisgoes outside the parameters of Kentucky law by makingthe act of using false documents to get a job and support a family a felony."

Delahanty said bills attempting to do that have failed to pass in Kentucky.

"We certainly hope the current administration and its Justice Cabinet has procedures in place to protect people from this kind of police action," Delahanty said.

"Tragedies like the death of Ana Romero indicate how badly we need comprehensive immigration reform in this nation, and the Catholic bishops will continue to urge members of Congress and the next president to pass and sign this needed legislation."