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An Irish tourist who fell ill and overstayed his visa was disappeared by ICE for "roughly 100 days" [1]
['Jason Weisberger']
Date: 2025-07-15
Irish tourist "Thomas" was visiting his girlfriend in West Virginia when he tore his calf. Ordered not to fly by his doctor, the Irishman proactively contacted his embassy and the US Department of Homeland Security to notify them of the medical emergency. Rather than be allowed to return home, ICE trumped up a story and arrested him.
From there, Thomas ended up in ICE custody, where for months he was swapped between multiple detention facilities with no clue what was going on or how to get out of this situation, including an ICE processing center in Folkston and the Federal Correctional Institution, Atlanta. He signed an order agreeing to deportation, but ICE continued holding him anyway.
At various points he was locked down, unable to contact his family and given only one hour of outdoor time a week. At the facility in Atlanta, he lived in freezing, filthy conditions, surrounded by pests, with limited toilet access and food full of "chunks of bones and other inedible items."
"Nobody is safe from the system if they get pulled into it," said Thomas in an interview after he finally made it back to Ireland. He added, "The staff didn't know why we were there and they were treating us exactly as they would treat BoP prisoners, and they told us that. We were treated less than human."
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