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With 90 confirmed cases –89 prisoners and a guard– in just two weeks, the Leticia prison became one of the main sources of coronavirus contagion in the country’s prisons, accompanied by the Villavicencio prison, which now exceeds 800 cases.
In the Leticia prison, whose first recorded case was that of an Inpec official, 49% of the prisoners have already been infected, given that in this prison there are 181 inmates in total. In addition, the Amazon Governorate confirmed that a prisoner who was in home prison died of covid-19.
(It may interest you: In one month, covid-19 cases in prisons already reach 962)
With 718 cases in the entire department, the situation in Amazonas is worrying when contagions are measured in proportion to its population: some 78,000 citizens. So, Amazonas today registers an alarming rate of 544 infected per 100,000 inhabitants, far exceeding the national average, which is 19.55. 30 deaths have also been recorded in this department.
While the situation in Amazonas worries, that of the Leticia prison in particular has set off all the alarms for being a massive outbreak in a place with overcrowding that reaches up to 53%, and which makes it difficult to implement measures such as distancing.
As reported by the Inpec, they are currently carrying out coordination efforts to isolate the infected prisoners, and they are seeking medical attention for the inmates with the municipal Ministry of Health.
In Leticia prison the overcrowding is 53%.
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However, the dragoneante Luis Díaz, president of the Inpec union in Leticia, commented that this prison establishment does not have the infrastructure to isolate anyone. “The overpopulation we have is a risk for everyone,” he explained. The dragoneante added that last week coronavirus tests were done on about 100 inmates but more than 80 are missing.
And he said that although Inpec staff received protection elements from the Penitentiary and Prison Services Unit (Uspec), the supplies they gave the prisoners were thanks to external donations and are about to end.
Aura Carmenza Navia, an ombudsman in Amazonas, also pointed out that the Leticia prison does not have a way to handle the number of infections.
(Also read: Prisoner reports chaos in Villavicencio prison due to covid-19)
“At the beginning, a very small patio had been arranged to have infected people there, but at the moment there is no site to isolate the more than 80 patients,” said the defender.
We do not have the infrastructure to isolate any inmate and the overcrowding that we have is a risk for all
And he added that to analyze the specific actions they will take, today there will be a meeting with the defenders to review the human rights situation in the prison. At that meeting they hope to be able to specify the legal situation of the prisoners in order to support the processing of requests for release by Government decree 546.
“As far as we know, only 10 people had benefited from that decree: 9 for theft and one for non-food assistance. But taking into account the number of infected people, which is already alarming and a very serious bomb, I think it would be necessary to take urgent and immediate measures ”he indicated.
To the concern over the situation of the penitentiary was added the College of Criminal Lawyers of Colombia. Its president, lawyer Francisco Bernate, pointed out that since the release decree was issued – the second week of April – it had been said that the possibility of a second, broader decree was to be studied, and that has not happened.
We believe that there has been negligence in this situation, which has led to dramatic numbers of infections in prisons such as Leticia and Villavicencio.
“We believe that there has been negligence in this situation, which has led to dramatic numbers of infections in prisons such as Leticia and Villavicencio,” he stressed. By the Government’s release decree, until Monday, 408 prisoners had been released to prison at the national level.
The Ministry of Justice told EL TIEMPO that they are carefully analyzing the situation in the prisons of Leticia, Villavicencio and others, and that they are working with the local health secretaries and the Uspec to care for prisoners and carry out tests.
They also said that a second decree is being worked on to speed up the releases and that this Wednesday they hope to deliver detailed information on the work they have advanced in this matter.
JUSTICE*
* With Health information
On twitter: @JusticiaET
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