‘I am scared to be here’: Lawsuit seeks to halt ICE’s Camp East Montana operations over alleged standards violations
by Cindy RamirezMay 30, 2026
Citing severe medical neglect, violent use of force and excessive use of solitary confinement of migrants, the ACLU of Texas and other legal and human rights organizations late Friday filed a lawsuit against Immigration and Customs Enforcement over inhumane conditions at Camp East Montana.
The 78-page lawsuit asks a federal court to prohibit ICE from continuing to operate the facility while it remains out of compliance with federal detention standards, arguing that the government’s decision to keep the facility operating despite inspection findings was unlawful and should be overturned.
The ICE Office of Detention Oversight found dozens of violations of national detention standards at Camp East Montana that potentially exposed detainees to excessive force, disease and other unsafe conditions. The congressionally mandated inspection was conducted in February.
“No human being should ever have to go through this,” Gerald Akari Angye, one of four detainees named plaintiffs in the suit, stated in an ACLU news release. In the month he’s been at Camp East Montana, he has been severely beaten after insisting to talk to an attorney before signing documents. He was hospitalized, placed in a wheelchair for his injuries and locked in an isolated cell when returned to the facility, court documents state.
“I have already experienced torture in my home country of Cameroon (Central Africa) and I never thought I would experience such severely violent treatment by guards here in the United States of America. I have been beaten here and even today, I still have a brace on my hands and wrist. I am in pain and I am scared to be here.”
ICE and the Department of Homeland Security have consistently defended conditions at Camp East Montana.
The $1.24 billion East Montana Detention Facility, located on Fort Bliss land in far East El Paso, opened in August under President Donald Trump’s mass detention and deportation efforts. The facility quickly faced numerous allegations of widespread violence, inhumane treatment and detention standard violations, and calls for its closure continue to grow. Three people have died at the detention center, including one that was ruled a homicide involving facility staff.
About 2,500 people were detained at Camp East Montana in early April, the latest data available. The facility is a civil immigration detention center, and therefore detainees’ confinement must not be punitive, the lawsuit states.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, is believed to be the first first against the nation’s largest immigration detention center. Four detainees are named as plaintiffs, alongside the ACLU of Texas, ACLU, Texas Civil Rights Project, Human Rights Watch and the law firm Farella Braun + Martel LLP.
The plaintiffs also ask that the case proceed as a class action lawsuit instead of as individual cases.
RELATED: ICE detainees are dying by suicide at an ‘alarming’ rate, an AP investigation finds
“Day-to-day life at Camp East Montana is dire,” the lawsuit states, as detainees are regularly subjected to severe beatings or sexual harassment by guards, squalid living conditions, spoiled and inadequate food and inadequate medical care.
“People report starting to mentally deteriorate while held in these conditions day after day, no longer feeling human and contemplating suicide,” the lawsuit states. “Some who cannot take it anymore ask to be deported, giving up their chance to stay with their families in the United States where they have lived for decades.”
Detainees are often pressured and coerced by ICE and guards to give up on their immigration case, sign third-country removals or self-removal forms, the lawsuit states.
The plaintiffs cite accounts of civil rights violations, including:
● Severe medical neglect and disease outbreaks, including a months-long measles outbreak that infected at least 14 people.
● Violent uses of force by officers against detained immigrants and coercive threats of deportation.
● Excessive use of solitary confinement to punish people for requesting basic needs such as medical care or hygiene.
● Inadequate, frozen and rancid food that have caused detainees to lose extreme amounts of weight and become ill.
● Exposure to dust storms through openings in tent walls that subjects people to respiratory disease.
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● Dangerous and unsanitary living conditions in the tent camp, including overflowing sewage
One plaintiff, identified only with the pseudonym Navdeep, states he feels like a “political pawn” taken from his job and family and forced into a tent not designed for human life.
“We could die here, and it feels like no one here would care. With everything happening behind closed doors, I worry the people running this place might cover up the truth about a death or the other injustices that happen here,” he stated in a news release.
Navdeep, who the lawsuit states has preexisting injuries that prevent him from putting his hands behind his back without severe pain, was locked in solitary confinement for appearing to refuse guard’s orders to do so.
Another plaintiff, identified only as ZOR, has been in detention for eight months. He had three of his teeth broken after being beaten by another detainee as guards stood by and watched, according to the lawsuit. A guard took his crucifix and threw it in the trash, the suit states.
According to the court filing, ZOR was shackled and driven to the Mexican border just four days after arriving at Camp East Montana. The officers allegedly told him to leave for Mexico, falsely claiming he had been granted asylum. He was not shown any papers and was not able to contact his attorney.
Officers have attempted to deport him about five times during his detention, despite a court order prohibiting his removal to his country of birth, the lawsuit states.
READ MORE: ICE inspection finds dozens of detention standard violations at Camp East Montana
In February, more than a dozen measles cases were reported at the facility as allegations of inadequate medical care grew.
In March, ICE terminated its contract with the facility’s operator, but kept the same medical provider – Loyal Source Government Services. Another contractor at Camp East Montana was recently terminated. Akima Global Services, which provided security services, was replaced with GardaWorld Federal Services LLC. The lawsuit states that despite the change, the guards are largely the same people.
Savannah Kumar, a staff attorney at the ACLU of Texas, in a news release called Camp East Montana the “epicenter of the administration’s cruel deportation agenda.”
“People from across the country have been transported to a military base in the middle of the desert and locked in a tent detention camp plagued by death, outbreaks of disease, and beatings by guards,” Kumar said in a statement. “The lawsuit sheds light on the horrendous conditions the U.S. government has imposed upon people detained at this tent camp.”
The organizations named in the suit – alongside Estrella del Paso and Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center in El Paso – were among civil rights groups that in December and May sent letters to the federal government detailing interviews with dozens of detainees.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
This article was originally published on El Paso Matters here.
