Iraqi Refugee Detained at Mira Loma Tries Suicide

LANCASTER — An Iraqi refugee detained by the federal government at the Mira Loma jail attempted to kill himself by taking an unknown number of over-the-counter painkiller pills, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said Monday.

Mohammed Jassin Tuma, 28, was rushed to the Antelope Valley Hospital Medical Center on Sunday night and returned to the facility later that night, Deputy Jim Hellmold said.

“He is out of danger but is on a 72-hour observation,” Hellmold said Monday.

Hellmold said that at about 6:10 p.m. Sunday, an Iraqi cellmate discovered Tuma on the floor, complaining of stomach pain. He was treated by the jail’s medical staff before being taken to the hospital, Hellmold said.

He had taken an unknown quantity of ibuprofen, a painkiller alternative to aspirin, Hellmold said.

“The inmate must have secreted the ibuprofen when he was brought to Mira Loma facility” on March 27 from Guam along with 58 other Iraqis, Hellmold said.

A friend who met Tuma and his family in Guam said the Iraqi “is devastated” to be separated from his wife, 7-year-old daughter and two sons, 3 and 5 months, who live in Nebraska. The friend, who asked not to be identified, described Tuma as a chemical engineer who deserted dictator Saddam Hussein’s army in 1993 to join the Kurd opposition in northern Iraq, where he became involved with the CIA.

“It’s very, very sad. I could not believe this is happening to a good man in the United States of America,” the friend said.

Tuma is one of seven men--including a journalist, two doctors and a pilot--being held in Mira Loma, a county jail leased by the federal government. They are among 22 Iraqis held in California jails pending hearings on their applications for political asylum. Their wives and children were granted asylum a few weeks after they were brought to Mira Loma on March 27.

They are some of the 7,000 or so Iraqis and Kurds evacuated from northern Iraq, the largest evacuation ordered by the U.S. government since Vietnam, after last summer’s failed CIA-led coup to oust Hussein.

The inmates say they were all loyal U.S. allies. The U.S government looked after them at the Anderson Air Force Base in Guam for nearly six months before sending them to several states of their choice. But at the last moment, Immigration and Naturalization Service and FBI officials decided that at least 22 of them--including 13 being held in Bakersfield and one woman who was recently released from a San Pedro jail--have questionable backgrounds that might pose a security threat to the United States.

Immigration courts in San Pedro and San Francisco are expected to judge most of these cases before the end of this month.

The INS leases the 500-prisoner Mira Loma facility from the Sheriff’s Department for $69.52 per inmate per day, and it is up to the deputies who still staff the jail to guarantee the inmates’ safety, said Virginia Kice, western regional spokeswoman for the INS. Kice said there are currently 473 federal inmates at the facility.