The Drug Enforcement Administration has apologized to a San Diego college student who nearly lost his life after being left handcuffed in a cell for more than four days without food or water. The student, Daniel Chong, had been arrested in a drug raid along with six others. He was not charged with any crime and was due to be released. But instead, the DEA says agents forgot about Chong after placing him inside a holding cell in handcuffs. Chong says he could hear DEA staffers outside his cell, but no one answered his pleas for help. He drank his own urine in a bid to survive before finally being found just as he says he felt his life slipping away.

Daniel Chong: “That was when I really felt my life go. And for some reason, they heard me that time and turned on a light and found me. At first I was just relieved to be alive, 100 percent. But, you know, I started realizing what happened to me.”

Chong says he plans to file suit against the DEA in the coming days.