Judge blasts officials in cancer case

LOS ANGELES, March 13 (UPI) -- A U.S. judge in Los Angeles blasted the alleged actions of immigration officials in the case of a detainee with cancer as "beyond cruel and unusual" punishment.

The officials were accused of withholding a critical medical test and other treatment from a detainee who later died of cancer.

The decision by U.S. District Judge Dean Pregerson allows the family of Francisco Castaneda to seek financial damages from the government, the Los Angeles Times said.

Castaneda, who suffered from penile cancer, died Feb. 16. Before his release last year, the government refused for 11 months to authorize a biopsy for Castaneda to treat a growing lesion despite several doctors saying the test was urgently needed.

The judge bitterly criticized what he called public health officials' "attempt to sidestep responsibility for what appears to be ... one of the most, if not the most, egregious" violations of the constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment that "the court has ever encountered."