Detention: Despite overcrowding in prisons, a third of inmates in Peru remain unsentenced | Overcrowding | Peru Prison System | ECDATA | ECDATA

In Peru, 36.98% of prisoners – one in three – serve detention orders; That is, he is in prison without being sentenced. According to the most recent report by the National Institute of Prisons (INPE), out of 94,759 people in prisons, 35,040 are awaiting resolution of their processes.

This is not a country-only phenomenon. Its scope is regional: among the 15 Latin American countries, Peru ranks ninth in the highest percentage of preventive detention cases. The highest figures were recorded in Paraguay (66.5%) and Bolivia (62.70%) and the lowest in Uruguay (7%).

An average of 35.92% of prisoners in Latin America are incarcerated without conviction. Meanwhile, in the European Union, this figure reaches 20%, a difference of more than 15 percentage points.

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), there are “Almost 12 million people around the world are deprived of their freedom, almost a third with impunity, and half the countries are full of prisons”.

“Preventive custody is not a sanction expected of the accused, but rather has a practical nature: it seeks to prevent the accused from escaping or obstructing the process. It should be a last resort. [debería aplicarse de forma] Exceptional. […] Its misuse or abuse is not confined to Peru”Rafael Sanjan, criminal lawyer and professor at PUCP explains.

The highest-profile cases in detention involve political leaders linked to corruption crimes: former presidents Alejandro Toledo and Ollanda Humala, former mayor of Lima Susana Villarán, Fuerza Popular leader Keiko Fujimori, and others.

However, this is only a small part of the total. More than half of unconvicted prisoners (57.68%) entered prison for three crimes, their worst forms or attempted crimes: aggravated robbery (28.62%), illegal drug trafficking (16.97%) and rape (12.09%).

10,027 people have been remanded for aggravated robbery. Criminal lawyer Romy Chang believes there is a poor use of the measure.

“In many cases [por robo agravado] If the crime is more obvious and/or flagrant delicto, you can opt for the expedited process and be sentenced in approximately one month. […] But for a lawyer, seeking remand is quicker and easier than presenting his case directly.He questioned.

On the other hand, almost 6,000 prisoners have not been sentenced for illegal drug trafficking. According to the INPE, most of those convicted of this crime are ‘purriers’, one of the lowest levels in the hierarchy of these criminal networks.

“The majority of illicit goods from international criminal organizations fall into transit. […] Punitive treatment should design other support mechanisms because it is a crime that has an economic meaning.”The prison authority is highlighted in its latest yearbook.

For Chang, there is a structural problem with both the regulation and application of criminal terms. “There are crimes with very high penalties, but their function, to rehabilitate, is not being fulfilled. “Crimes do not stop because the penalties are high.”he said.

“Jail overcrowding and delays in judicial process are closely related. “Many of the world’s imprisoned people have never been convicted of any crime.”cites the UNODC report (2021).

One of the main problems of the Peruvian prison system is overcrowding: 49 of the 68 prisons have over 20% of the population and more than half of the 10 inmates are behind bars.

In Bolivia – the country with the second-highest percentage of unsentenced prisoners in the region – the increased use of detention is a factor exacerbating overcrowding. This was confirmed by the country’s prison director, Juan Carlos Pinturas, in an interview with local newspaper La Razón. “Judges fear censure”He declared.

In Bolivia, the prison population is 174% and in Peru it is 124%.

“Pre-trial detention is one of the main factors in the critical situation experienced in Bolivian prisons and causes an objective situation: overcrowding. The other two fundamental factors are police corruption and the links of criminal networks with power.I said Trade Gisela Derpic, Bolivian lawyer and university professor.

In Uruguay, the situation is completely different: the percentage of prisoners in detention is only 7%. Criminal judge Claudio de Leon said that until a few years ago, cases of unconvicted prisoners in his country were close to 80% of the total, but in 2017 there was a drastic change.

“In 2017, after many attempts, a paradigm shift occurred when a new Criminal Procedure Code came into force. […] A more agile mechanism is established, which is the process [penal] In short; For some crimes, the parties involved may reach agreements with others.Commented in a conversation with Trade.

But improving prison governance is a complex process, of which the proper use of the image of detention is only one part.

“Uruguay’s 15,000 inmates put the country in the top 10 in the global ranking of prison populations, and one of the first in Latin America and the Caribbean, an almost uninterrupted upward trend for 17 years”Refers to a document from Ceres, a think tank specializing in public policy.

For Judge de Leon, one of the main challenges for his country’s justice system is to reduce the number of cases of repeat offenders, which he confirms – currently over 60%. In Peru, inmates with more than one admission to a prison center account for 24.24% of the total.

“Re-mutation is what worries us the most. Resources should be invested after graduation [de la cárcel] of a person deprived of his liberty to reduce recidivism. I think the number of prisoners will be reduced in this way.The Uruguayan magistrate concluded.