In northern Colombia, police stations are packed and unsanitary

Published on: 08/06/2022 – 18:58Modified on: 08/06/2022 – 19:06 Men piled up on top of each other, sometimes in very poor health: this is what images taken in the cells show three police stations in northern Colombia in mid-May. The Ombudsman’s delegation – which took these images – denounces the poor conditions of detention of these people, sometimes locked up for several years. “Sixty people in a 4m2 room, we cannot live”, denounces a man in a video, shot in a cell of the main police station of Riohacha, the capital of the department of La Guajira, in the north of the Colombia. About twenty men are visible there, on the ground and in hammocks. {{ scope.counterText }} {{ scope.legend }} © {{ scope.credits }} {{ scope.counterText }} i {{ scope.legend }}© {{ scope.credits }} This video was shot by a delegation from the Defender of the People, a Colombian state institution monitoring the protection of human rights, as part of a mission carried out in La Guajira in mid-May. On this occasion, she also visited two other police stations, in the towns of Maicao and San Juan del Cesar. prison”The Ombudsman’s delegation denounces the conditions of detention in these three police stations: During our visit to the main police station in Riohacha, 356 people were detained in two cells of approximately 5m2 and in a approximately, while its capacity is 80 places. They were accused of theft, extortion, scam, homicide, sexual offence… “The problem of prison overcrowding has transferred to police stations” This overcrowding problem dates mainly from the Covid-19 pandemic. 19. Previously, if a person was arrested and sent to the police station, a hearing had to be held within 36 hours to determine whether they were remanded in jail or not. However, during the pandemic, the country’s prisons stopped receiving new prisoners, to limit the risk of contagion inside, and even now, they receive very few new people. Suddenly, the problem of prison overcrowding transferred to the police stations. Moreover, there are very few judges in Riohacha to deal with the cases of the arrested persons. Theoretically, the arrested persons should therefore not stay more than 36 hours at the police station. But in Riohacha, almost all the detainees had been there longer. One of them had even been there for five years. “No doctor ever comes to see them” Police stations are not designed to accommodate detainees over the long term, so for them it’s worse than prison. For example, in terms of health, nothing is planned, no doctor ever comes to see them. The police call the ambulance only in the event of a life-threatening emergency. As a result, the prisoners are in poor health. We saw one, locked up for three years, who had a kidney problem, a fever, and apparently there was blood in his urine: we demanded that he see a doctor outside. But then he had to come back to the police station. “It’s no way to treat a human being, I’ve been in severe pain for two days, and they haven’t taken me out yet, they’re waiting for me to die,” said this prisoner, in a cell of the principal Riohacha police station in mid-May. He was then able to see a doctor, before returning to the police station. © Defender of the People (video blurred by France 24). In addition, the detainees almost never wash, even if basins are sometimes provided to them for this. So many have skin problems, and it smells bad in the cells. In addition, the town hall of Riohacha provides food to the detainees, because it is its duty, but in insufficient quantity, which does not help them to stay healthy. healthy. A particularly thin detainee, in a cell at the main police station in Riohacha, in mid-May. © Defender of the People (photo blurred by France 24). “The detainees are locked up all the time” The other problem with police stations, compared to prisons, is the absence of a courtyard where the detainees can go out: they are therefore locked up all the time. In addition, the police are unable to manage visits from the families of detainees. Some therefore receive visits, but once every six months. Consequently, there are mental health problems among the detainees. In one of the cells of the Riohacha police station there is a toilet, but in the other there is not: the detainees thus make their needs in sachets. Only toilet in this cell of the main police station in Riohacha, in mid-May. © Defender of the People (video blurred by France 24). “They relieved themselves in the small boxes where they received food” That said, concerning insalubrity, the Maicao police station is even worse. During our visit, there were 170 detainees, for a capacity of 60 places. Most were in two cells, without toilets, so they relieved themselves in the small boxes where they received the food. They then threw them in a patio, where there were strong smells and flies. Some detainees were also in a hangar – with a WC – and in a hallway. {{ scope.counterText }} {{ scope.legend }} © {{ scope.credits }} {{ scope.counterText }} i {{ scope.legend }}© {{ scope.credits }} About the police station in San Juan del Cesar, there were 25 detainees in two cells, with a capacity of five places. The town hall did not give them food, whereas it is its duty. So it was the families of a few prisoners who brought the food, which they shared. San Juan del Cesar police station, mid-May. Left: the two cells where the detainees are locked up. Center/right: the interior of one of these two cells. © Defender of the People (photos blurred by France 24). According to the Defender of the People, nearly 21,000 people were detained in the country’s police stations in May, for a capacity of 6,983 places. The most critical locations were on the Caribbean coast and in the departments of Antioquia and Valle del Cauca.