Lurigancho Prison

By Christina Swan

In scholarship on human rights there are many contradictions. Discussions on human rights as they relate to policies and people in the criminal justice system are particularly polarized and contradictory. The Lurigancho Prison in Lima, Peru is a good example.

The 30 year long internal conflict in Peru revolved around the threat of ruthless terrorists groups who wanted the country to have a communist state, and an equally ruthless government willing to do anything to exterminate the terrorist threat. In the process, innocent people were sent to prisons under the accusation of being involved in terrorism. Many of these innocents were people who spoke out against, or reported human rights violations on the part of the government. It wasn’t uncommon to be convicted without a fair trial. Some of these political prisoners were sent to Lurigancho Prison. Above is a photo taken of some of the inmates packed into a cell.
On the morning of June 18th, 1986 in 3 different prisons in Peru including Lurigancho Prison, inmates took hostages and began rioting. Some sources say that specifically at Lurigancho, the rioting and violence was sparked because it was visitor day and the guards were not allowing visitors in. In a grueling two day bout, police and military fought and killed to take back control of the prisons. The president at the time, Alan Garcia, stated that after an initial investigation in the first 6 days after the rioting 40 to 50 people in Lurigancho alone were murdered after they surrendered. Over 100 people inmates died in the fight. Although Garcia promised justice for the massacre victims, it would take over 20 years for the Peruvian government to get serious about investigating the police and military killing and brutality that took place over those two days, and even then, mostly due to external pressure.

Today the prison is not much better. National Geographic featured this prison as one of the worst in the world. Above is a picture of the entrance way the visitors come through. It leads to a gate that surrounds a large complex of about 20 pavilions. The gate around the complex is about as far as the prison guards go. The inmates have complete reign and control over what goes on inside the gates. They decide who gets food, who has a place to sleep, who lives, who dies, who is sexually abused. . Many of the pavilions have one or several leaders that all get together and have meetings about various daily dealings of the prison. They are the only kind of organization this prison has. Due to this fact one can only get a rough estimate of how many inmates there really are in the prison. The official capacity of Lurigancho is 1600, and experts estimated in the year 2000 that there were about 6000 inmates.

The availability of elicit substances, and weapons is high. Also, because of the inmates’ propensity to have sexual intercourse amongst themselves, there is a high risk of HIV/AIDS, and other sexually related diseases. Above is a picture of two transvestites who live at Lurigancho. As evidenced by their gaunt faces and bodies, they are infected with HIV and have no way to good treatment. Tuberculosis is also a problem.
In a broad sense, you could argue that many of these individuals are in this prison because they violated someone else’s human rights. Hans Veeken wrote in the British Medical Journal that some of these inmates have come to this prison without any trial; therefore the government is violating some of the inmates’ human rights as well.
The polarized part of the discussion on policies regarding prisons is the question of whether people who violated the rights of someone else are entitled to those rights themselves. In many ways it would seem that the Peruvian government does not think so. It appears the well being of these inmates are not a priority to them: they are left at the mercy of other inmates with no protection; they have little access to health care; food is scarce; they have limited access to the judiciary system to try to appeal their convictions.
On the other end of the spectrum are human right proponents who say that an individual who murdered or raped someone else deserves to have access to legal help, food, water, shelter, safety, health care, etc.
Who says which view is right? In many ways this specific example illustrates some of the broad and widespread discussions on human rights. Arguments about the definition of human rights and who is entitled to them seems to have existed since the idea of human rights itself. It would seem that until there is a comprehensive and universal consensus on these things, human rights violations will always be a problem.

Sources:

Mobilizing for Human Rights in Latin America by Edward Cleary
Lurigancho Prison: Lima’s “High School” for Criminality by Hans Veeken
http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/videos/player.html?channel=60850
www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB64/index.html
www.blythe.org/peru-pcp/Diario-e/heroe-e.htm