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Jamaican deportee describes weeks of isolation at Eswatini maximum-security prison

Oct 8, 2026·Location: Matsapha, Eswatini

Country of origin: Jamaica

Jamaican deportee describes weeks of isolation at Eswatini maximum-security prison
Photo via hrw.org

Orville Etoria, a Jamaican man transferred by the United States to Eswatini under its third-country deportation program, described in a deposition being held in extreme isolation during his first weeks at Matsapha Correctional Complex, a maximum-security prison. He said he was barred from communicating with anyone outside the prison for two and a half weeks, confined to his cell except to be fed, and treated 'as if we were violent, even though we had done nothing wrong,' until guards came to see the US government's portrayal of detainees as false.

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