People in jail are obviously the outliers in society. The important thing is why they are in jail. There is no rational or obvious reason why a free society should naturally inhibit say, murder, or other anti-social behavior, nor is it a reflection on the freedom enjoyed by the rest of the citizenry if lots of such criminals are locked up. In point of fact, locking up criminals is a means to freedom for everyone else. That issue is just semantic nonsense, playing on the various meanings and connotations of the word 'free'.

But that's as a point of principle, and in reality, of course, there are considerable issues with the current system and its prison-industrial complex, but again, comparison to other countries don't really mean as much. I see no reason why it is odd that the Seychelles should be first, given how small their population and the propensity for statistical clustering in small samples. That's why in ACTUAL competitions that use averages and rates of occurrence to determine a leader in achievement, they have a minimum qualifying number.

Not to mention the effectiveness of the system. There are clearly differences in the quality of law enforcement in the US and in Mexico, and the results are undeniably skewed in one direction, given all the Mexicans who vote with their feet to play Russian roulette with our ravenous prison-industrial complex, rather than enjoy the greater freedoms of their homeland.

But the comparisons expressed as ranks are meaningless, as the criteria selected for ranking. Only a lunatic would seriously suggest that Mexico is doing something better than the US in regards to criminal justice, regardless of their "superior" rate of imprisonment.
Which is absolutely true, BUT not at all demonstrated by comparing our imprisonment rate to other countries where the plethora of differences render such comparisons meaningless.
Based on the "authorial insertion" characters of the one TV show I have watched by the same main-writer, I would bet that way too.