A Haitian woman who died days after ICE briefly took her into custody spent around 24 hours across the last two days of her life in sub-freezing weather in a bus shelter on the South Shore, per visual records released by Pittsburgh Regional Transit (PRT) this week.
Daphy Michel died on March 2, four days after departing the Washington County Correctional Facility, where she spent six months awaiting a preliminary hearing on misdemeanor charges of terroristic threats and harassment, which were ultimately dismissed. She was turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which fitted her with an ankle bracelet and released her under the agency’s Alternatives to Detention Program on Feb. 28.
Her death chilled the region’s Haitian community, which is centered around Charleroi, where Michel lived. It also raised questions about ICE’s responsibility for the safety of people it detains and then releases, with the agency declaring on social media that she was an “illegal alien” who was detained briefly but then “released with all of her belongings, including a fully charged phone, in sunny weather in the middle of Pittsburgh, where public transport is readily available.”
In response to questions from Public Source Wednesday, Acting Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Lauren Bis reiterated the earlier statement, adding: “All illegal aliens who are processed have access to phones to call family, friends, and attorneys.” Bis did not address questions about whether ICE has investigated or altered any policies.
Pittsburgh’s Public Source filed a request under the Right-to-Know Law asking PRT to release any bus video footage from Feb. 27 through March 2 showing the bus shelter at East Carson Street and the Smithfield Street Bridge that included anyone believed to be Michel. PRT released several hundred short video snippets, many of which do not clearly include Michel. Time stamps below are from the PRT videos and temperatures are from publicly available weather data for the South Side.
March 1, 2026 9:40 a.m.
30°F
March 2, 2026 5:31 a.m.
22°F
March 2, 2026 7:55 a.m.
23°F
March 2, 2026 8:57 a.m.
24°F
March 2, 2026 9:53 a.m.
25°F
Pittsburgh’s Public Source is publishing still images, which more clearly reflect Michel’s status in the shelter, rather than raw video — a decision further informed by our standards around how we portray people in their most vulnerable moments.
The images that include Michel span just over 24 hours. A full review suggests that Michel may have been in the shelter the entire time. Her position changed little, other than moving from one side of the bench to the other from the morning of March 1 until early on March 2.
Death of Haitian immigrant still an unsettling mystery seven weeks later
The final video shows an apparent employee of PRT’s Way Department standing over Michel’s prone body just before 10 a.m. The death notice from the medical examiner indicates she was pronounced dead at a hospital at 12:14 p.m.
PRT spokesperson Adam Brandolph indicated in response to questions that the shelter is owned by the City of Pittsburgh, and that transit agency police rendered aid to “an unconscious individual.” PRT did not conduct further investigation, and is not aware of any other investigations into the death. The agency confirmed that it has also reviewed the video and determined “that Ms. Michel was at the city-owned bus shelter in the early morning hours before she was found unconscious.”
The Allegheny County Office of the Medical Examiner has not yet released the cause and manner of Michel’s death, pending test results. The wait for toxicology tests can sometimes stretch for months.
Michel entered the U.S. legally in 2022 and was pursuing an asylum claim, according to her attorney, Joseph Murphy.
Southwestern Pennsylvania’s Haitian immigrant community has felt heightened tensions for more than a year and a half since then-candidate Donald Trump claimed they were straining resources and ruining quality of life in Charleroi, a Washington County borough where hundreds had settled. Late last year President Trump’s administration revoked the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designation that allowed Haitians to live and work in the United States while violence and instability rocked their home country. That revocation was halted by a judge in a case that was argued before the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
Editor’s note: This story was amended to include comment from the Department of Homeland Security after initial publication.
Sophia Lucente is a freelance reporter and photographer in the Pittsburgh area and can be reached at sophia.lucente@outlook.com.
Rich Lord is the managing editor at Pittsburgh’s Public Source and can be reached at rich@publicsource.org.
Public Source director of audience & visual strategy Natasha Khan edited and contributed to the visual layout of this story.
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