Physical violence tops causes of death for Salvadoran prisoners, according to an NGO report

San Salvador.- Physical violence tops the causes of death in Salvadoran prisons in the context of the exception regime, which in March turns four years old and suspends constitutional guarantees, with about 32% of the at least 470 cases, according to a report released this Wednesday by the non-governmental organization Socorro Jurídico Humanitario (SJH). The report, which gathers “the versions of family members“, as the official information is under secrecy, indicates that 31.8% of the cases were “violent deaths“, while 31.6% of the people would have died due to “lack of medical attention due to illnesses”. In 31.1% of cases, the information is “unknown”, while 4.7% is classified as death from terminal illness and 0.9% as “apparent suicide”. The SJH document states that “in few cases was the proper police ocular inspection and recognition for the crime of homicide carried out“, and that the authorities “despite the fact that many of the bodies showed signs of violence, they assigned them the alleged crime of ‘to investigate death’ (so as not to be counted as homicide and not be investigated as such, seeking to cover up the perpetrators)“.

“In many cases, the bodies were delivered in closed coffins so that the families would not open them; and in some cases, they sent police or military personnel to the wakes, in order to intimidate the relatives,” the report adds.

The state of exception in El Salvador has been implemented since March 2022, following an escalation of gang violence that claimed the lives of more than 80 people in a weekend.

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The government of President Nayib Bukele has defended the continuation of this measure with the support of the Legislative Assembly, dominated by the ruling party, Nuevas Ideas (NI). However, the document indicates that “94% of the deceased were not gang members, in most cases they had no criminal record or history and some cases had a history, but not related to gangs“. Most deaths have been recorded in Izalco prison – located in the western zone of the country – with 192, while in the mega-prison of the Terrorism Confinement Center (Cecot) only 4 are reported, although the security authorities have said that no deaths have been recorded in this maximum security prison for gang members.