350,000 Haitian nationals face potential removal following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision clearing the way for the Trump administration to terminate Haiti's Temporary Protected Status, and Pierre Damas Bel, 20, was among them. Bel, a Haitian-born student in Springfield, Ohio, died Monday after walking into oncoming traffic on Interstate 70, Ohio State Highway Patrol confirmed. His family says the death was a suicide driven by the shame of an ankle monitor he was required to wear by the Department of Homeland Security.
Bel had worn the device for weeks before his death as part of an enforcement push affecting Haitian immigrants in the Springfield area. A month before he died, he wrote on social media that he had come to the United States to pursue an education, not to commit a crime, and that he was "carrying a feeling of shame and humiliation" while walking with a GPS device on his leg. He made two trips, to Cincinnati and Westerville, asking officers to remove the monitor so he could play college soccer. It cost him his spot on the Wittenberg University men's soccer team.
He graduated from high school in May and was enrolled to begin his first semester at Wright State University. On the Friday before his death, August 28, he told his father the ankle monitor had prevented him from receiving a JROTC uniform with his classmates. "Dad I felt humiliated," his father, Pierre Ronal Bel, quoted him saying on that day.
That Monday morning, Bel left home before 8 a.m. and called his father to say he was not mentally okay. His father asked him to come home but was taking his youngest child to school when police arrived at the family's door.
Springfield pastor Carl Ruby, sitting with the family after the death, wrote on Facebook that Bel "threw himself in front of a semi truck." The family, through Ruby, attributed the death directly to the immigration policies of President Donald Trump, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin.
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine, a Republican, called the death "a horrible, horrible tragedy" and said Bel was well liked, active in junior ROTC, and had clear aspirations for his future in the United States. Wright State University President Sue Edwards described him as "an active honors student who was passionate about soccer." ICE said it does not comment on cause of death during a pending investigation and will not speculate about unverified claims.
Roughly 15,000 Haitian immigrants live in the Springfield area. Many have been in the United States for years, unable to return to a country that has faced years of violence, turmoil, and poverty.