About a fortnight after Camp East Montana, an multiculturalism detention facility in El Paso, Texas, started letting people building themselves, an emergency call was made about a defendant trying to harm himself. It was 2: 50 p. m. on Friday, Sept. 12.
A nurse told the operator,” We have a client in holding who claims to have swallowed some foreign objects and has refused our basic medical care here.” In the background, you can hear people yelling and moaning.
He is currently able to speak and is currently hunched over his stomach, the nurse said. A foreign thing was discovered after a tentative X-ray was performed. We simply need to transport him to the hospital closest so that they can check whether the object is officially in his program and possibly unearth it.
I’ve been covering Camp East Montana for a while. It was intended to serve as a model for how the Trump presidency would carry out mass deportations because it is situated on desolate military lands. Rather, it served as an illustration of what could go wrong. Despite accusations of brutal conditions and misuse, which Department of Homeland Security officials have called” absolutely false,” it continues to operate. According to The Associated Press, ICE intends to maintain the facility’s operation for at least through 2027.
Three people died at Camp East Montana between December 2025 and January 2026, making it one of the nation’s most deadly detention facilities at the time.
My investigation into the death of one of those guys, Geraldo Lunas Campos, a 55-year-old Caribbean regional with a history of mental illness, was published in ProPublica and The Texas Tribune in July. A medical examiner declared Lunas Campos ‘ death a homicide after an altercation with soldiers over his treatment. Initial reports from the Trump presidency that he had been in health problems were made, but afterwards Department of Homeland Security officials claimed that guards had used force to prevent him from killing himself.
Lunas Campos was detained at Camp East Montana, and we discovered that he had constantly expressed concerns about his mental wellness. Despite constantly claiming to be working, records show that staff didn’t move him to a facility that could provide him with better care.
I was interested in learning more about how the hospital handled these situations. I spoke with workers, government officials with contacts with the service, prisoners, doctors, and activists who had spent time inside the detention center after receiving recordings of more than 160 emergency calls.
I inquired with Government about my monitoring and some of the 911 calls. The facility offers” complete medical services, including mental health services,” according to a director who declined to comment on the specific issues raised in the calls. According to the director, the defendant is referred to local emergency services if they require a higher level of health care. The standard added that the care they receive while incarcerated is the best they’ve ever received.
I want to talk to you about some of those 911 names right then. They provide a view into what’s happening in a position writers don’t have access to, even though it may be hard to listen to or read on. Names and my inspection reveal problems in responding to medical and mental health emergencies that go beyond those experienced by one person. ( Take note that some recordings were edited to remove lengthy periods of silence. )
Oct. 12, 2025:” They will not offer them health care.”
Some were becoming so needy that they were having friends and family members call 911 to request medical assistance on their behalf two weeks after Camp East Montana began holding prisoners. On October 12, a North Texas resident called three times to request that a defendant he identified as his companion receive crisis care for his kidney stones.
Why is the ability not calling? the user asked.
” Because they don’t care,” They are uninterested in any of the prisoners. They don’t worry, they won’t offer them health care. He does no enjoy visiting the doctor. It’s no joke, because it’s very, very significant when he says he’s in emerging discomfort at a level 10 out of 10 and needs to go to the emergency room.
A 32-year-old Cuban man identified by a surname, Xavier, who fits the profile of the person with kidney stones, claimed in a statement to lawyers that he had taken a hunger strike because he had never received any information about his situation or a judge date. Being here is “feeling like torture,” he said. I believe that this event is finishing me emotionally and physically. At this location, I don’t think I’ll be able to live for another fortnight. They behave like creatures around us.
Nov. 2, 2025:” We don’t have any gas for her”.
The skilled professionals themselves complained about how little they could do for their clients in some of the emergency calls.
A nursing assistant at the hospital dialed 911. She claimed to have a 46-year-old COVID-19 patient who was having trouble breathing and consuming less air. The issue is that we don’t have any air for her, particularly if she begins to desaturate yet more, she tells the controller. She simply doesn’t seem great.
” OK. Let me ask for assistance, OK. Just keep with me, the technician pleads with her.
Later in the call, the nurse details that she has been ill for the past few days and that she has requested that the clinic have her checked out. ” I’m just worried about her because she was just brought in now, bless her heart.”
Feb. 28, 2026:” Was this sudden or purposeful”?
Three persons had already passed away at Camp East Montana by later February. The first was Francisco Gaspar-Andres, a 48-year-old Guatemalan person who passed away from liver and kidney failure on December 3, 2025. Finally, on January 3, Lunas Campos passed away. More than two weeks later, ICE reported that Victor Manuel Daz, a 36-year-old Nicaraguan who had been detained during Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis, had been discovered unconscious and tied to a piece of cloth around his chest. His examination has not been disclosed to the public.
The 911 names remained on call throughout.
” OK, we have a man who has taken too much.” He’s a detainee, a caregiver told a dispatcher on February 28.
She claimed that they were unaware of the 60-year-old man’s recent arrival at Camp East Montana or of what he had taken about an hour prior. People had witnessed him “popping supplements” and stumbling about.
Was this done by accident or by design? the user asked.
” Intentional,” she said.
We Really Need Get Him to the Hospital, as the headline read in the initial ProPublica post Listen to 911 Calling From Inside an Immigration Detention Center.
