DeWine: Death of Haitian immigrant, Ohio student a ‘tragedy’
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COLUMBUS, Ohio (Statehouse News Bureau) — Gov. Mike DeWine said Tuesday morning the apparent suicide of a Haitian immigrant and Wright State University student was “horribly, horribly tragic,” adding the ongoing federal immigration efforts near there are “very misguided.”
Pierre Damas Bel, 20, died late Monday in Clark County after walking into a roadway and getting hit by a vehicle, according to Ohio State Highway Patrol. OSHP is still investigating the case.
The recent Springfield High School graduate said in July he was ordered by federal authorities to wear a GPS ankle monitor, according to Instagram.
“I didn’t come here to commit a crime or hurt anyone,” Bel wrote. “Yet now I’m walking through the streets of the United States with a GPS monitor on my leg, carrying a feeling of shame and humiliation that I never imagined.”
Before he’d posted that, he’d mostly posted high school highlights, from graduation to extracurricular actives, like the Marine Corps Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security terminated the short-term protected statuses of most Haitians nationwide a few weeks ago, after a drawn out legal battle. By local estimates, some 12,000 to 15,000 immigrants from Haiti were living in Springfield in 2024, a southwest Ohio city with a population of less than 60,000, according to census data.
DeWine, a longtime vocal opponent of ending that protected status, told reporters in Columbus that Bel was a “well-liked” young man.
“I’m told, by those who knew him, he had great dreams about what he could do in this country and what he could contribute to this country,” DeWine said
DeWine condemned ongoing immigration enforcement there and elsewhere in Ohio.
“Is it really wise to look at someone like that and say, we’re going to kick you out of the country?” he said “To me, just doesn’t make any sense.”
U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno (R), who has long criticized that short-term protected status, called the incident “terrible.”
“No matter your nationality or your immigration status, for somebody to take their own life, I can’t imagine the trauma that family is suffering,” Moreno told reporters Tuesday afternoon.
But broadly, he said, “we welcome immigrants in this country, a million immigrants a year, but we need them to come here the legal way.”
According to WYSO, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrests have been increasing in Springfield in the last few weeks. Among those detained is at least one faith leader, Pastor Joubert Adrien.