“He Didn’t Need to Die”: How Camp East Montana Failed a Detainee in Mental Health Crisis

Geraldo Lunas Campos, the 55-year-old Cuban immigrant whose January 3 death at the Fort Bliss tent facility was ruled a homicide, complained at least eight times during more than 100 days in detention about missed or delayed antipsychotic medication, according to a ProPublica review of his nearly 300-page medical file. In October, staff found him with a bedsheet tied around his neck but logged it as a “suicidal gesture” rather than hospitalizing him. Medical experts who reviewed the records described “systemic neglect,” noting the facility lacked suicide-proof rooms and never completed a transfer to appropriate mental health care that staff had discussed as early as October 8.