2023-04-17 04:27:00
State authorities acknowledge that the situation in prisons and cities has gotten out of control due to the actions of groups linked to drug trafficking
Death once again showed its devastating jaws in the prison universe of Ecuador. “We are in the worst moment of crisis of violence in the country“, acknowledged the Minister of the Interior, Juan Zapata, after 13 inmates lost their lives in two prisons between last Friday and this Sunday. Twelve prisoners died in the El Litoral prison, in Guayaquil, whose facilities were recovered by the authorities after the serious confrontations between inmates that once again shocked the Ecuadorians.
“God is great, he is the only one who can, to put his hands on and cover this jail so that there are no more things,” he told the newspaper. The universe from Guayaquil a woman who has her son locked up in one of the pavilions. The fear that horror will take over the facilities again is latent in the relatives of the prisoners.
Las territorial disputes between drug gangs in the main cities have moved from the neighborhoods to the prisons. Some of these groups are related to Mexican cartels like the one in Sinaloa. According to the prison authorities, the latest incidents began with a brawl between members of the Los Tiguerones and Fatales gangs.
???? “Help! Help me!” are the chilling screams that were heard this morning inside the Loja prison.
Women, from the rehabilitation center, shouted for help from the Police.
The residents of the sector, concerned, sent several videos to the media… pic.twitter.com/N88OFjiJZh— Monica Velasquez (@MoniVelasquezV) April 16, 2023
amazing numbers
Since 2021, the fights between those factions have provoked only in prisons 431 deaths. In September of that year, some 120 inmates died in the Guayas 1 detention center, in what is considered the largest prison massacre in that country. Of the 12 massacres in those institutions, 11 have taken place since the former banker Guillermo Lasso assumed the presidency, 23 months ago. prisons from 2021.
The situation in the detention centers has led to a visit to the country by a delegation from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), at the end of 2021. Four months later, the delegation made its conclusions public. It was then recommended that the Government substantially modify its criminal and prison policies, as well as reduce the population in prisons with the application of pretrial detention on an exceptional basis. The IACHR in turn called for the State to guarantee the institutional strengthening of the prison regime and ensure “detention conditions compatible with human dignity.”
For Fernando Bastias, a member of the Permanent Committee for the Defense of Human Rights of Ecuador (CDH), Lasso has ignored these suggestions. “Yeah the State does not have control of the centers it cannot even carry out its public policy of social rehabilitation,” he said.
The Committee of Relatives for Justice in Prisons, with the support of the Permanent Committee for the Defense of Human Rights (CDH), proposes in this context to sue the State for the lack of protection of the people who were murdered in prisons.
Families have gone through scenes of permanent torture. Crying, pain, anguish, diseases.
But before they were also victims of the corruption of the penitentiary system that the country lives.#ElEstadoEsResponsable pic.twitter.com/Ah78rKRplO
— Committee of Relatives for Justice in Prisons (@JusticiCarcelEc) April 16, 2023
growing concern
The wave of violence that goes from the prisons to the streets has increased dangerously. “You have to admit that panic is setting in the country. There is not a day when many are horrified by the different videos and photographs of murders, robberies, kidnappings. Members of criminal organizations film themselves proud of the strength they have by arms. Yes. They are scenes of horror that frighten many,” said the newspaper Trade de Quito in its Sunday editorial. “Ecuador ceased to be a land of peace. The newscasts have become red Time.news reporters,” said José Gonzalo Bonilla, a columnist for The Telegraph.
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The prison and security crises take place at a time when the opposition is trying to push forward in Congress a political trial for embezzlement against Lasso. “They want to see me out because I am uncomfortable for many of them, not for all, because of the frontal fight of my government against drug trafficking and also against different groups accustomed to co-opting the State and carrying out acts of corruption,” he said, confident that the initiative against him will not prosper.
#Death #leaves #scary #mark #prisons #Ecuador