Colombian officials receive preventive detention for torturing inmates in riot

A judge issued preventive detention for three Colombian prison officials for inflicting injuries and torture on detainees during and after the riot that occurred at the La Modelo prison in Bogotá in March 2020, where 24 inmates died.

“The probative material shows that the officials had beaten, stripped and even wounded detainees who were already defenseless and when apparently the situation had already been controlled inside the cells,” said the Prosecutor’s Office this Saturday. it’s a statement.

Officials from the National Penitentiary and Prison Institute (INPEC) also neglected the medical care needs of some of the wounded with a firearm who, apparently, were locked up in isolation cells, according to the prosecution’s account.

They are charged with the crime of aggravated torture, given their function of public service, and the judge ordered an assurance measure in a prison for one of them and at their home for the other two.

The riot of March 21, 2020, supposedly organized to demand greater protection against covid-19, was the worst massacre of prisoners in Colombia in memory and lasted for ten hours, leaving 24 inmates dead and a hundred injured.

Journalistic investigations later revealed that all but one of the deceased presented rifle shots when they were in a defenseless state, for which they were probably massacred and an excess of force of the guards was demonstrated.

In addition to the riot in La Modelo, that night there were riots in about ten Colombian prisons, among them those of La Picota and Buen Pastor, in Bogotá, the latter of women; as well as those of Cómbita, in the department of Boyacá; Picaleña (Ibagué); Jamundí (Valle del Cauca), and Pedregal and Bellavista, in Antioquia. (I)