Experts look at the Judicial Branch, which has received a wake-up call from the president and enjoys little trust among the public.
The military are already on the streets of Guayaquil and other provinces of the country where crime has increased considerably, but is the declaration of a state of exception enough to stop crime?
Security experts consulted by this means consider that the support of the Armed Forces to the National Police is necessary, but they say that much more can – and should – be done than what was announced by President Guillermo Lasso on October 18, since when the 60-day period of the state of exception applies.
The idea is that this measure does not remain in the registry, as has happened before, when nothing was solved.
“If drug trafficking is not stopped, nothing will change,” says Colonel Mario Pazmiño, a former Army Intelligence chief and an expert in security and defense. He has been insisting on the need for the military to support the police, but not simply in an arms control task in the streets, “a Joint Task Force must be formed” against drug trafficking and agents of a specialized unit of the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
This is because, in many cases, those who commit crimes go free due to some bad procedure in the judicial process. Raising correct charges on the hardest and leaving no room for loopholes that criminal defenders often take advantage of is an observation made from Miami by the Ecuadorian César Paz, a former FBI agent who specializes in the fight against drug trafficking.
“You must also seek and liquidate its sources of financing,” says Paz, and for this, proper application of the laws is necessary. “If the criminal knows that he can move in an environment of impunity, he will not be afraid of anything and every time violence will escalate in prisons and on the streets, because both scenarios are related.”
Carrying of arms in Ecuador: Regulation suspended permits 12 years ago and the ‘deterrent effect’ against crime was lost
Pazmiño complements, in the same sense, that the specialized unit that he proposes to prosecute more and better the crimes of money laundering linked to drug trafficking. “You have to give them where it hurts the most: your pocket.”
According to the explanatory memorandum of Decree 224 signed by Lasso last Monday, there is a “correlation between the amount of drug seized and the increase in the homicide rate.”
Drug seizures between January and October 2021 reached a record 147 tons compared to 128 tons captured in 2020, while intentional homicides rose to 1,885 (eleven per 100,000 inhabitants) compared to about 1,400, respectively, according to figures. officers. Of the nearly 1,900 violent deaths, 1,112 were categorized as criminal violence as of October 17, a day before the declaration of a state of emergency.
For the president, this shows a “retaliation” by criminal gangs for decisions such as installing radars in provinces such as Manabí, where the Armed Forces have detected at least 40 lands that have served or could be used for drug planes.
For John Garaycoa, security expert, the greatest weight of action against crime is centered on humane decisions of judges and prosecutors. The Police are limited to apprehensions, they do not prosecute, accuse, judge or dictate where and for what crime the detainees should be held.
“The state of exception gives legal power for the military to act, but it is a patch measure. According to my criminological studies, only 30% of security solutions are made up of physical security, intelligence and police procedures, but 70% of any prevention plan is the human factor of public and private organizations ”, says Garaycoa .
He suggests the use of the polygraph as a tool to ensure the suitability of workers in the field of the Judicial Branch or bank employees, whose clients are increasingly being robbed by pencil sharpeners.
In his speech last Monday, Lasso also referred to the actions of the Judiciary. “The law should intimidate the criminal, but not the police,” he said first. “Our judges must guarantee peace and order, not impunity and crime,” he remarked in another part of his message to the nation when he promised to create a legal defense team for members of the public force who have been accused of acting. against criminals.
Citizens in Guayaquil, the epicenter of the wave of violence, also demand actions from the Municipality, although security is not its competence.
In addition to the integration between the Corporación para la Seguridad Ciudadana de Guayaquil (CSCG) and the ECU911 to deal with emergencies from a single room, the Municipality bought in November 2019 for $ 2.7 million 100 video surveillance cameras with a public address system that included the supply of 100 licenses of the Facial recognition analytics software that can be used in any of the approximately 1,350 cameras that the CSCG has.
And although the link with a database of the National Police is still pending, for the recognition of suspects, that does not prevent the operation of the surveillance team, clarifies the Corporation.
The Personal Data Protection Law, which includes access to and decision on information and data of this nature, was only approved in May of this year and there is still no regulation or authority to apply it.
For another project, the Municipal Council approved on October 6, unanimously, an inter-institutional cooperation agreement between the Municipality and the CSCG that consists of a contribution of $ 33 million that will be made in parts, over the next four years, to acquire 15,000 security cameras with artificial intelligence to support the National Police, according to Mayor Cynthia Viteri.
His legal initiative, delivered to Lasso on October 9, for citizens to carry weapons to deter crime, is not very well received, according to the latest survey by Click Report, which indicates that 78.48% of its respondents in Guayaquil and 71.21% in Quito consider that the use of weapons should not be allowed.
According to the same survey, crime is right now the country’s biggest problem (23%), above unemployment (18.5%) and the economic crisis (18%). And although the majority trust a little more in the Armed Forces (71%) than in the Police (57%), the institutions of the judicial system enjoy little trust among citizens, the Prosecutor’s Office (26.5%) and judges ( 23%), according to the survey. (I)
Mario Twitchell is an accomplished author and journalist, known for his insightful and thought-provoking writing on a wide range of topics including general and opinion. He currently works as a writer at 247 news agency, where he has established himself as a respected voice in the industry.
