Kent man says he was beaten and held in UAE jail

Ryan Pepper, a 27-year-old from Ashford in Kent, says he has been beaten, threatened and psychologically abused in a United Arab Emirates jail, with injuries serious enough to send him to hospital. Advocacy group Detained in Dubai says Pepper has been held for more than seven months without explanation, meaningful legal access or private communication with his family.

Pepper was detained in Dubai on 3 November 2025. In handwritten notes smuggled out of custody, he said that “everyone was beaten up” inside the site where he was being held. His family says he was kept in isolation for about 20 days, and that he spent months in solitary confinement without daylight. They say they fear he could die in custody.

KentOnline reported that Pepper moved to Dubai in May 2025 after a relationship breakdown and was arrested after returning from a trip to New York in November 2025. His sister, Chloe Pepper, said he told the family that teeth had been pulled out and medication taken away. She said he appears to be missing four teeth.

The family says it still does not know why Pepper was detained or whether he has been charged. Detained in Dubai has raised urgent concerns about arbitrary detention, torture allegations and the treatment of British nationals in UAE custody. The group says the case has become an example of what it describes as a system in which foreign detainees can be cut off from explanation and basic contact with the outside world.

The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said it is in contact with Pepper’s family and continues to raise the case with local authorities. It also said the UK takes allegations of torture and mistreatment extremely seriously. The agency has not publicly explained Pepper’s detention or said whether charges have been filed.

The case sits within a wider pattern human rights groups say is familiar in the Gulf. Human Rights Watch says the UAE has blocked international human rights organizations and UN experts from visiting prisons and detention facilities, and has documented a record of arbitrary detention, unfair trials and secrecy in detention cases. In its work on transnational repression, the group says governments often target critics abroad through detention, abuse and pressure on relatives, and that such cases can involve torture and ill-treatment. Human Rights Watch says it has documented more than 100 such cases, with more than 75 included in its 2024 report.

For Britain, the question is no longer just what happened to Ryan Pepper inside a Dubai detention site. It is how far London is willing to push a close regional partner when one of its own citizens says he was beaten, isolated and left without a clear legal path out.