The Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement are the defendants in a federal complaint that paints a stark picture of life inside Camp East Montana, the sprawling tent-based detention complex located on Fort Bliss outside El Paso. Filed on May 30, 2026, the lawsuit — brought by four named detainees with backing from the ACLU of Texas, Human Rights Watch and other civil-rights partners — seeks class certification and a judicial finding that the facility’s conditions violate detainees’ rights.
The filing compiles multiple allegations: repeated physical abuse by staff, widespread medical neglect, contagious disease outbreaks and living conditions described as filthy and unsafe. The complaint references at least three deaths at the camp since it opened in 2026 and reports of a months-long measles outbreak. Plaintiffs ask the court to provide remedies for everyone currently held at the site and those who will be detained there in the future.
What the complaint alleges
The lawsuit lists a series of concrete complaints about routine practices and day-to-day realities inside the tent camp. Plaintiffs describe a pattern of severe medical neglect — missed prescriptions and delayed care for conditions such as HIV, cancer and diabetes — and attribute multiple preventable harms to those lapses. An internal inspection in February documented 49 violations of detention standards, including failures to monitor people at risk of self-harm.
Beyond medical concerns, the complaint recounts incidents of alleged violence. One named plaintiff, Gerald Akari Angye, says he was beaten by guards, hospitalized, placed in a wheelchair and later kept in solitary confinement for 15 days. Another person identified as Navdeep reports contaminated toilet water entering living spaces and breathing problems from dust, while many detainees describe food that is insufficient and spoiled, limited access to hygiene items and cramped, windowless housing units.
Disease outbreaks and deaths
The complaint cites a months-long measles outbreak that temporarily closed the facility to visitors and infected at least 14 people, according to reporting cited in the filing. The tent camp has also recorded at least three deaths since operations began in 2026. One death — of Cuban national Gerald Lunas Campos — was ruled a homicide by the El Paso County Medical Examiner’s Office, and ICE has faced scrutiny for alleged failures to prevent or properly investigate fatalities and serious medical events.
Voices from inside and outside the camp
The lawsuit includes personal statements from plaintiffs who describe the psychological and physical toll of detention. Erik Ivan Rodriguez, a named plaintiff, says his time at the camp has been the worst period of his life. Another detainee using the name ZOR describes the operation as “lawless” and emphasizes the anguish of parents separated from their children. Those accounts are presented alongside legal analysis from the civil-rights groups that represent them.
Advocates argue the facility’s existence and operation are emblematic of larger policy choices. Attorneys with the ACLU of Texas and partner organizations characterize Camp East Montana as central to a federal enforcement strategy that moves people across the country and confines them in tent housing in a desert environment not designed for long-term human habitation.
Legal claims and requested relief
The complaint asks the Western District of Texas to find violations of the Fifth Amendment right to due process and to review agency action under the Administrative Procedure Act. Plaintiffs request class-action status so remedies would apply broadly to all detainees and seek court orders to stop the alleged abuses and to require systemic corrections in how the facility is run.
Government response and ongoing oversight
Department officials named in the suit include the ICE director and the DHS secretary. In response to media inquiries, DHS representatives have called the allegations “categorically false” and pointed to routine audits and inspections they say ensure compliance with national detention standards. DHS maintains that detainees receive meals, water, medical treatment and opportunities to communicate with lawyers and family members.
Despite those assurances, the camp has drawn attention from members of Congress and outside watchdogs. Lawmakers have made unannounced visits, and previous correspondence from advocacy groups documented dozens of interviews with detainees reporting patterns of excessive force, inadequate medical care and unsanitary conditions. Those records — and the deaths and documented standard violations — underpin the Legal action now before the court.
Why the case matters
At stake in the litigation is more than the fate of a single facility. The complaint frames Camp East Montana as a test case for how the U.S. will treat noncitizens who are detained under immigration enforcement priorities. Plaintiffs and their counsel say a successful challenge could force immediate reforms to living conditions, medical access and staff conduct, while also setting precedents about the limits of agency discretion in detention policy.
The court will now weigh whether the factual record supports class certification and whether the federal government must alter operations at a site that, according to the complaint and accompanying documentation, has seen deaths, disease outbreaks and widespread rule violations since it opened in 2026.