Sometime between Friday night and Saturday morning, 16-year-old Jaydun Garcia took his own life at a makeshift home for youth who lack foster placements.
Jaydun was the second of five brothers and had a baby sister. He was very close to his siblings, those who knew him said, and a close friend to many kids in foster care.
鈥淗e was always building us up, like helping us all,鈥� said Jacie, a friend of Jaydun鈥檚 who lived with him for months in the Albuquerque office building of the New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department, where case workers have often housed kids who don鈥檛 have foster homes available to them.
鈥淗earing that he's gone, it just like broke us, and it took a piece out of us,鈥� she said. Jaydun and Jacie both belonged to a tight-knit group of foster youth 鈥� teens who had spent much of their lives in foster care and had spent years held in group facilities. He loved to draw and was an athletic kid who loved basketball, especially the Los Angeles Lakers 鈥� a person whom friends would seek out when they needed someone to talk to.
For this story, Searchlight spoke to six people with direct knowledge of the circumstances of Jaydun鈥檚 death. Most of them asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak with the media, or because of sensitivities related to the case.
鈥淗e was always building us up, like helping us all,鈥� said Jacie, a friend of Jaydun鈥檚. "Hearing that he's gone, it just like broke us, and it took a piece out of us."
In an email, CYFD communications director Andrew Skobinsky wrote that the department could not comment because of confidentiality laws. 鈥淲e are only authorized to release information when it is determined that abuse or neglect caused a child鈥檚 death,鈥� he wrote. 鈥淎ccordingly, no further information can be provided.鈥�
Jaydun鈥檚 death comes after years of promises by CYFD to stop housing its foster youth in group settings and to provide them adequate mental health care 鈥� promises that were made as part of the 2020 settlement of a class action lawsuit that claimed the state鈥檚 child welfare system was 鈥渓ocking New Mexico鈥檚 foster children into a vicious cycle of declining physical, mental and behavioral health.鈥�
Now, half a decade later, CYFD has failed year after year to meet its commitments to those promises, according to independent .
Instead, it has housed children with serious mental and behavioral health needs in youth and its office buildings, where they have been , and exposed to fentanyl and other drugs.
鈥淲hen I go visit a client who is living in these settings, I see their mental health declining sharply,鈥� said Sara Crecca, an Albuquerque-based youth attorney who was co-counsel for the plaintiffs of the class action suit.
Amid mounting criticism from attorneys, legislators and advocates, CYFD in June 2024 began moving youth from its office complex to a : a former Albuquerque halfway house built for girls transitioning out of juvenile detention.
It was in that building that Jaydun died last weekend, discovered in the bathroom by his roommate, another teenage boy.
The death in itself is beyond tragic, friends and attorneys say 鈥� a loss made all the more painful by the fact that CYFD had continued to house Jaydun and other youth in congregate care despite barrages of warnings that such housing was a 鈥�,鈥� particularly those who were suffering mental crises, with staffing shortages sometimes leaving kids with nowhere to turn.
鈥淭hey're supposed to be the one people that we trust, the ones that we go to when we have problems,鈥� Jacie said of CYFD. In the wake of Jaydun鈥檚 death, nobody from the department had reached out to Jacie to offer therapy or counseling, she said.
鈥淚f they really cared, they would be on top of getting us therapy. They would be on top of us having a home 鈥� a forever home, an actual home with parents鈥� love 鈥� not removing us, not putting us in shelters, not putting us in the office. We're not getting that.鈥�
Still, the events of last weekend felt unexpected to those close to Jaydun.
鈥淐YFD had promised him a lot of support鈥� during the last year, a close acquaintance of his told Searchlight, asking that they not be named because of the sensitive nature of the case. 鈥淗e seemed to be optimistic about his future.鈥�
This first appeared on .