Daijiworld Media Network - Texas
Texas, Jan 16: The death of a Cuban migrant held at a federal detention camp in Texas earlier this month may be investigated as a homicide after preliminary findings reportedly pointed to “asphyxia due to neck and chest compression” as the cause, raising serious questions over conditions inside US immigration detention facilities.
Geraldo Lunas Campos (55), who was in the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), was pronounced dead on January 3 at Camp East Montana, a large tent-based detention facility located within the Fort Bliss military base in El Paso. ICE initially said Lunas Campos died after “experiencing medical distress”, adding that the cause of death was under investigation.
However, according to a recording reviewed by the Washington Post, the El Paso County Medical Examiner’s Office informed a family member that it was preparing to classify the death as a homicide, subject to the outcome of a pending toxicology report.
Lunas Campos had been arrested by ICE in July last year and was previously highlighted by the Department of Homeland Security as among the “worst of the worst” detainees, citing past convictions including child sexual abuse, firearm possession and aggravated assault.
His death comes amid growing scrutiny of ICE detention centres. Lunas Campos was one of four detainees who died in ICE custody within the first 10 days of the year, making 2025 the agency’s deadliest year in more than two decades so far. A Guardian investigation reported that December 2024 alone recorded six deaths, the highest monthly toll in recent years.
Human rights groups have repeatedly criticised Camp East Montana over allegations of abuse and inhumane living conditions. Lunas Campos was also at least the second detainee housed at Fort Bliss to die in recent months. In late 2024, Francisco Gaspar-Andres (48), a Guatemalan national previously held at the same facility, died in hospital following health complications.
ICE officials said in a statement that Lunas Campos had been placed in segregation after becoming “disruptive while in line for medication”. According to the agency, staff noticed him in distress and summoned on-site medical personnel, but he was declared dead at 10.16 pm.
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Detainees present at the camp, however, have given a sharply different account. Santos Jesus Flores, who was detained at the facility, told the Washington Post that he witnessed several guards restraining and choking Lunas Campos after he resisted being moved to segregation because he did not have access to his medication.
“He kept saying in Spanish, ‘I cannot breathe, I cannot breathe,’” Flores said, adding that Lunas Campos’s voice eventually went silent.
The El Paso County Medical Examiner’s Office has said the autopsy report is still pending and not yet available to the public. ICE and county officials were not immediately available for comment on whether the death would be officially ruled a homicide.