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Ecuador prison deaths climb again despite Noboa security strategy, data shows
Inmate deaths hit 1,220 in 2025 with violence and illness rising amid 30.6% overcrowding despite military-led security and new prison facilities, officials reported.
- On Feb 16, Reuters found that prison deaths almost quadrupled in 2025, with at least 206 killed during violence and a 256% rise in illness-related deaths.
- After the 2021–22 riots, President Daniel Noboa made restoring order central and deployed the military to certain penitentiaries while building new prisons, and the government says these moves reduced violence and dismantled criminal operations.
- Officials say adult prisons are overcrowded by 30.6% and the national inmate population rose to 35,454 last year; inmates deemed highly dangerous were moved to El Encuentro, a new maximum-security prison with capacity for 800 and strict rules.
- Relatives of inmates and rights organizations allege mistreatment and food shortages, while Rodrigo Varela referred complaints to prosecutors and described a health and food crisis.
- Authorities have been transferring inmates to break up gang control, moving around 900 inmates in January, while the planned facility for more than 15,000 inmates is scheduled for completion in 2027, SNAI said.
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Daniel Noboa , president of Ecuador, put prison control at the center of his security plan when he came to power in 2023, after hundreds of deaths in riots during 2021 and 2023. However, although the riots went down, the deaths increased. Daniel Noboa’s balance sheet: why did deaths in prisons increase? Deaths within Ecuadorian prisons almost quadrupled in 2025 due to violence and natural causes, including an epidemic of tuberculosis , indicate …
Coverage Details
Total News Sources9
Leaning Left1Leaning Right3Center4Last UpdatedBias Distribution50% Center
Bias Distribution
- 50% of the sources are Center
50% Center
13%
C 50%
R 37%
Factuality
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