Two months after
Iris Dayana Monterroso Lemus lost her son to a stillbirth last year while detained by U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, the Trump administration issued a public response to her allegations that she did not receive prenatal care.
“This reporting is absolutely FALSE,” said Tricia McLaughlin, then a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, in a statement. “Iris Dayana Monterroso-Lemus had FULL medical, prenatal care.”
The statement, labeled as a “Fact Check,” said the Guatemalan-born Monterroso Lemus had “received prenatal care, including an ultrasound and OB-GYN visit.”
Neither side of the disputed account provided evidence to back up their claims.
Now, federal government documents obtained by The Intercept appear to undermine the Trump administration’s version of events. The documents show a lack of basic care needed for a healthy pregnancy, according to expert analysis. One document from an outside healthcare center made after the stillbirth describes a “pregnancy complicated by lack of PNC” — meaning prenatal care.
“The administration was engaged in CYA — cover your ass,” said Dr. Andrea Schecter, an OB-GYN physician with a decade’s experience working with high-risk pregnancies, including those of immigrants. “They know that what they provided is probably not sufficient care.”
“Flouting the Directive”
The new records, obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, include documents from Monterroso Lemus’s visit to Ochsner LSU Center, a healthcare facility in Shreveport, Louisiana, after she complained for days about not feeling fetal movement. It was the only recorded instance of her leaving Richwood Correctional Center, an ICE detention facility run by the
family-owned private prison giant
LaSalle Corrections.
The Ochsner LSU documents, produced after the stillbirth, say that Monterroso Lemus had told medical staff at Richwood that “this pregnancy didn’t feel right a couple days ago but nothing was
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