“La Tramacúa”: Colombia’s Abu Ghraib

This is surprising. I have been in two maximum security prisons in Colombia, Combita and Itagui, and found them to be far superior to US prisons, in terms of prisoner conditions.  After my first visit to Combita, I complained to some Colombian govt agency about conditions in Combita (that my client had complained about) and they investigated immediately, and took some action to correct them. Try that in the US and see what happens.

I also have had probably half a dozen clients who were incarcerated in Colombia. All were traumatized after being extradited to the US and could not believe the conditions at the DC jail. The DC jail is a little unusual, though, worse than any federal prison I have seen.

I would be glad to visit that prison sometime but I suspect that the claims are exaggerated.  It appears that the author of this article has not been there and is reporting based on a book he read. If there is really no running water and problems with fecal matter in the food (hepatitis) then I am sure the Colombian authorities would react.  But I have dealt with enough prisoners now to see their claims in perspective.

I am not criticizing the author, and share his concern with the humane treatment of prisoners, no matter what they have done. One of my clients died in prison in Chonchocorro prison in Bolivia. The prisoners there have to boil their water before they drink it. I also believe that the treatment of Simon Trinidad in Florence Colorado violates many of his human rights, particularly the fact that he is held incommunicado. But I would view the stories from this prison in Valledupar with some caution.

Paul

Paul,

With all due respect, you're taking your experience from two prisons that are not the one in the story and imposing them on one that you have not visited. That would be akin to me saying "I've been an inmate in 27 jails and prisons in the United States" (that's true) "so I know Guantanamo can't be as bad as they're saying!"

Nowhere does the author of the story make any claims about US prisons anyway.

In 13 years in Latin America, it never ceases to amaze me how some people seem to look for any chance to show off their expertise, even if applied to matters they are not directly expert on. Sigh.

Hi.  I'm the author of the article.  As a matter of record, I have not visited La Tramacúa.  However, the organization I work with, the Alliance for Global Justice, is the US Representative for the International Network in Solidarity with the Political Prisoners (of Colombia)-INSPP.  We are also the US organization that works most regularly in solidarity with Colombian political prisoners.  The research for this article, of course, included a good deal of internet searching and perusal of published material, but was equally based on talking directly to primary sources: prisoners, their families, their defenders and Colombian groups acting in solidarity with the prisoners.  I have great confidence in these sources. 

The fecal contamination is documented, as noted in the article, by an agency of the UN, of the Department of César's Health Services and the research of the delegation from Asturias, Spain.  The water shortages, fecal contamination and other abuses are widely corroborated.  The inclusion of reports from corporate media should underscore that these claims are not just those of the opposition.  Anyone who has had exposure to the Colombian movement in solidarity with the political prisoners will certainly know of the infamy in which La Tramacúa is held.

Regarding a general comparison of US prisons to Colombian prisons, I will readily admit that that is like the cliche says, "comparing apples and oranges".  The purpose of my article is not to say that Colombian prisons are either better or worse than US prisons.  While I haven't visited La Tramacúa itself, I have on different occasions visited Colombian political prisoners in jail.  Also, I am personally acquainted with people involved in social work inside Colombian prisons who are not members of the political opposition.  I know that in some regards, some prisoners in some Colombian prisons have been afforded certain freedoms and dignities not available to most US inmates.  I also know that no matter how repressive these prisons may be, that there is also a tradition among some--if not the dominant tradition--of seeing the prisons as places for re-education and re-socialization of inmates.  In fact, those freedoms and that tradition are threatened by the US restructuring of Colombian prisons.  And, studies and history show that Colombian prisons have also been places of much abuse and neglect, both before and after the "New Penitentiary Culture" introduced by the US Bureau of Prisons.

What this article is, is is an attempt to expose new developments in Colombian prisons directly related to the funding and oversight of US agencies--particularly in regards to 16 new prisons that either have been or are being built with US involvement.  La Tramacúa is the first of these prisons.  Instances of torture, beatings, abuse and neglect have not been done away with under the US guidance.  What's more, inmates are enduring conditions that should not be allowed in any so-called modern facility.

Perhaps the biggest story of all is that these US designed buildings coincide with a considerable increase in the number of those imprisoned and, more to the point, with an increase in politically motivated arrests and incarcerations.  Questions of abuse and conditions aside, what the US is underwriting is a massive increase in the capacity of Colombian jails to house those driven to crime by social upheaval due to economic crisis (substituted for social investment), and, above all, to repress, intimidate and remove political opposition, free speech and popular mobilization from Colombia's streets.  I'll soon be submitting a follow up to this article which will show in some detail exactly to what extent this is true.  Stay tuned.

By the way, Paul, I noticed your reference to Itaguí, where you visited.  Were you aware that Itaguí is one of the prisons where there is a large concentration of paramilitary chiefs?  The Colombian weekly, La Semana, over a year ago, wrote an exposé showing how paras in that prison were, from their cells, arranging drug shipments, ordering assassinations and directing the retaking of towns by para troops?  In fact, in a pavilion where several of these para bosses were housed, a grenade, pistol and stash of cash were found in an area adjacent to their cells?  This is not the sort of thing that would likely be revealed in a routine visit.

The director who was in charge at the time of this expose has gone on record saying her hands were tied when she tried to curtail paramilitary excesses.  She claims she was being ordered by higher ups all the way to the Minister of Justice to afford the paras special privileges.  As of yet, the Colombian government has not launched any kind of serious investigation to follow up on the Semana report. Itaguí, by the way, is not one of the institutions built or being rebuilt with USAID and BOP oversight--at least I've not yet found evidence to that effect.