Overview:
Relatives of Jean Wilson Brutus, who died one day after entering ICE custody in Newark, has launched a GoFundMe to cover funeral costs as they await answers about his death and pursue an independent autopsy.
NEWARK — Family members of Jean Wilson Brutus, who died while in custody of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), have launched a GoFundMe campaign to cover funeral expenses while they continue to seek answers about his death.
Brutus died Dec. 12, one day after he was detained at Delaney Hall, a privately run immigration detention center in Newark, New Jersey. ICE said he experienced a medical emergency and later died at University Hospital. The agency initially attributed the death to “natural causes,” then said the cause was “unknown” and later “inconclusive.”
For Brutus’s relatives, the shifting explanations have compounded their grief.
“To this day, we still have no clear answers about what truly happened,” Evans Belony, Brutus’s cousin and family spokesperson, wrote on the GoFundMe page.
“The lack of transparency has deepened our pain and left us with unanswered questions that no family should have to live with,” he wrote. “Today, our family is faced with the responsibility of giving Jean the farewell he deserves. This is about dignity. It is about respect.”
The GoFundMe campaign comes as Brutus’s relatives delay funeral arrangements while they seek an independent autopsy, a step they say is necessary before they can lay him to rest. Funds raised will go toward funeral and memorial services, burial expenses and a repass so family, friends and supporters can gather to remember him. The family says the sudden nature of his death and the ongoing investigation have made the financial burden overwhelming.
As of Jan. 22, only $424 of the $50,000 goal had been raised.
Seeking life in America
In appealing for donations, the family shared some details about Brutus’ life. They said Brutus fled Haiti because of escalating gang violence that has engulfed Port-au-Prince and surrounding areas, turning daily life into what they describe as a war zone.
“Jean did not leave his homeland because he wanted to.” Belony wrote. “He left because he wanted to live.”
Originally from Croix-des-Bouquets, Brutus first migrated to Brazil in 2018 before entering the U.S. in 2023 through the Biden administration’s humanitarian parole program, according to his relatives and immigration advocates. He settled in Irvington, New Jersey, where cousins say he lived with family and had an active asylum application pending.
Jean Wilson Brutus, relatives say, lived quietly but generously.
“He was poor in money but rich in heart,” Belony wrote. “He showed love through action.”
Finding a mysterious ending
Brutus’s death was the second reported death of a Haitian immigrant in ICE custody in 2025, according to the agency’s Detainee Death Reporting page. His passing has drawn renewed scrutiny of conditions at Delaney Hall, which opened in 2025 to help fill the Trump administration’s mass deportation quotas and faces repeated criticism from immigrant advocates and elected officials.
ICE has said Brutus showed no signs of distress during intake and had no documented history of cardiovascular illness. Advocates and lawmakers have questioned how he could die within hours of detention without clearer public accounting.
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