QUITO, ECUADOR – Pedro is a 51 year old father from the city of Esmeraldas, a largely Afro-Ecuadorian city on the coast of Ecuador, which has recently been named one of the most violent cities in Latin America. Esmeraldas has long had its fair share of violence, but over the past year, Pedro says it’s gone too far.
“They kill. They kill in extravagant ways, in terrible ways. They cut heads off, light bodies on fire, and upload videos [to the Internet],” he told Ojalá via telephone. Pedro, like others we spoke to for this article, asked that we change his name out of fear of recrimination.
At first, this kind of extreme violence was concentrated among members of two local gangs, Los Tiguerones and Los Gangsters, who were fighting over territory. Recently, however, they and other groups have started extorting local individuals and small businesses. Those who can’t pay, pay with their lives or their families’ lives. People rarely report these crimes, as they fear retribution and don’t trust the police, who often work with the same criminal groups, says Pedro.
“Citizens are living in relentless fear,” he said.
Recent escalations of violence have put Ecuador in the news lately. The small South American country has one of the fastest-rising murder rates in Latin America. Right wing President Guillermo Lasso has blamed the violence on armed groups battling for control of the cocaine supply chain that passes through the country, with citizens getting caught in the cross-fire.
But many say this is only a part of the story. Rather, large-scale impunity and corruption, along with a weakened state and social fabric, are major factors that have led Ecuador to this point.
Prisons and the production of violence
As recently as 2018, Ecuador had one of the lowest homicide rates in Latin America.
Last year 4,603 violent deaths were registered, an 83 percent increase over the previous year. And 2023 looks set to be even worse. Coastal cities like Guayaquil and Esmeraldas are now ranked among the region’s most dangerous.
This surge in violence began not long after the first prison riots following the killing of a key gang leader in Ecuador in December of 2020. A long standing rivalry between gangs over leadership and territorial control became a war, within prison walls and on the outside. As homicides skyrocketed, riots in Ecuador’s penitentiary system continued. Over the past three years, more than 400 prisoners have been killed.
Last year, the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (IACHR) released a report detailing corruption inside Ecuador’s prison system, where security guards allow guns, knives and explosives inside.
As the number of prisoners grows, prison budgets are cut back, while changing drug policies have led to an increase in prison sentences for selling drugs.
Juan, a 28-year old social work student in Guayaquil, told Ojalá his brother was killed in a prison riot in 2021, though the family doesn’t exactly know what took place. It took authorities two days to confirm that his brother was among the dead: prison guards didn’t know who was in what cell. Armed groups inside the prison control the prisoner registry, according to Juan.
Kimberley Michelle Brown 