Suspected drug overdoses involving at least three detainees have been reported at Camp East Montana, an ICE detention facility in East El Paso, raising fresh alarms about conditions inside the troubled center. Records reviewed by the El Paso Times show that two of those incidents unfolded on consecutive days — May 23 and May 24 — and involved men aged 35 and 34. Both cases were linked to psychiatric medication overdoses and self-harm.

"Equally troubling is the possibility that these suspected overdoses may not have been accidental … which raises harrowing questions about mental health treatment and suicide prevention inside the facility," said U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-El Paso, whose office first disclosed the incidents in a news release.

Escobar has since written to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and acting ICE Director David Venturella demanding answers. Her letter pressed officials on how individuals held under federal supervision could accumulate sufficient quantities of medication or illicit substances to overdose, and asked whether DHS or ICE had launched a formal investigation. She also sought details on the follow-up medical care provided to those affected and on what accountability measures would be applied to the facility's contractor.

Neither DHS nor ICE replied to a request for comment submitted by El Paso Matters.

The overdose reports add to a long record of problems at Camp East Montana. Earlier this month, a federal inspection found the facility in violation of multiple health and safety standards — among them, a failure to screen detainees for tuberculosis and a failure to house a high-risk individual in a suicide-resistant cell with appropriate monitoring. Escobar and other observers who have toured the site have consistently characterized its medical services as inadequate.

ICE swapped out the facility's primary contractor in March following a string of deaths, a measles outbreak and documented accounts of inhumane treatment. However, the medical subcontractor, Loyal Source Government Services, was kept on despite those concerns.

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