El Salvador sweeps incarcerate 25,000

Civil rights on hold after gang violence

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador — After a record-setting weekend of gang killings in March, the Salvadoran government declared a state of emergency and suspended civil liberties guaranteed in the constitution. The campaign of mass arrests that ensued led to the imprisonment of more than 25,000 people in about a month and a half.

Many of those detained have been sent to a prison known as “El Penalito,” or “little prison,” a building in the capital, San Salvador, that has become ground zero for perhaps a police crackdown in the Central American country. It is a first stop in what could be a long stay inside the country’s overcrowded prison system.

Many inmates spend anywhere from days to weeks inside El Penalito before being transferred to a maximum-security facility.

After the crackdown, relatives of those detained started to gather on the street outside, waiting to find out what would happen next.

Recently, dozens of mothers, grandmothers, sisters and girlfriends crowded around rickety wooden tables facing the prison, hunched over handbags stuffed with the documents they hoped would prove their loved ones’ innocence — government identity cards, school records, work badges.

El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, has conceded that innocents are being swept up in the crackdown, but insists they’re a small share of arrests. And the vast majority of Salvadorans — more than 80%, surveys show — support Bukele and approve of the government’s measures.

Local and international media have broadcast images of family members begging the police for information about their sons and screaming as they’re taken away. So far, this has not turned the tide of public opinion against the campaign of mass arrests or the president leading it.

For now, the women outside El Penalito are focused on keeping their sons fed. Bukele has bragged about rationing food to prisoners during the crackdown, so many families opt to buy their relatives meals from a government-authorized kitchen with a small outpost open outside the prison.

There used to be just one meal provider for everyone, but after so many arrests in recent weeks, another outfit next door was allowed to begin serving food and supply other necessities like toothpaste and boxers.

It has been difficult to determine how the Salvadoran police have identified their targets.

The government would not grant an interview with the head of the national police, but relatives of those arrested during the state of emergency said that many were targeted if they had past run-ins with the police.

Irvin Antonio Hernandez was arrested when he ran outside after his little sister, who had toddled after the family dogs. Hernandez, shirtless and shoeless, ended up in handcuffs.

“The only thing they said was ‘kid, come over here,’” said Noemi Hernandez, his older sister. “‘Put on shoes and a shirt and we’re going.’”

Hernandez was arrested several years ago, his mother said, when she says two gang members running from the cops ducked into their house. The boy was taken away, too, though Noemi Hernandez said her brother had nothing to do with the gang.

“He studied up until the ninth grade, and now he works,” she said, tears seeping through her mask.

“He sells fruit and vegetables and has his own house.”