Venezuela descends into chaos as oil prices drop

Murder rate rises as economy tanks

CARACAS, Venezuela — Her body, like the remains of so many lost souls here, was discarded along one of the capital’s highways, notorious dumping grounds for the ever-rising toll of homicide victims.

Savvy motorists avoid certain thoroughfares after dark, when carjack gangs set up ambushes, sometimes laying down nail-embedded strips to puncture tires of vehicles ferrying potential quarry. Motorists speak matter-of-factly of spotting body parts along roadways.

“She had a lot of life and was a hard worker,” said 24-year-old Wisneydi Colina, recalling her late friend, Pierina Patricia Jaspe Sanchez, 26, among the latest in the roster of those killed.

For Venezuela’s 30 million citizens, the collapse in oil prices and ensuing economic free fall have brought daunting hardships, including blockslong lines for groceries, shortages of medicines and rolling blackouts. But escalating violent crime, especially homicides, is perhaps the biggest concern, distorting daily life in ways both small and profound.

Although Venezuela has long been among the most crime-ridden nations, homicide statistics are a matter of heavily politicized dispute.

In February, the government rolled out its first official accounting in years, reporting that 17,778 people had been slain in 2015, more than 80 percent by firearms, for a homicide rate of about 58 per 100,000 people — down slightly from 2014.

But the Observatory of Venezuelan Violence, a think tank, reported 27,875 homicides last year, or about 90 per 100,000 people. That would put Venezuela in the company of gang-ridden Honduras and El Salvador for the distinction of being the world’s most homicidal nation. (For comparison, the homicide rate in the United States is about 5 per 100,000.)

Most crime victims are poor, but they also include members of the middle and upper classes and scores of police and military personnel killed each year, sometimes for their weapons.

Venezuelans blame corrupt law enforcement, government indifference, arms proliferation and a deteriorating economy. People suffering from schizophrenia and other mental ailments are wandering the streets lacking access to medications, psychiatrists say. Many see a chilling lack of regard for human life, a symptom of a once stable society gone badly astray.

“Before the thieves would only rob you,” is a common refrain here in Caracas, the capital. “Now they kill you.”

In a country where most perpetrators are never found, mobs are increasingly launching impromptu revenge attacks, often dousing suspected muggers with gasoline and setting them alight _ inevitably targeting the innocent by mistake at times. There have been 74 possible lynchings this year, according to authorities.

“The increase in the perception of insecurity and the lack of confidence in (police) … lead to people wanting to defend themselves however possible,” Ana Maria Rondon, a criminologist, said in an interview with the Observatory of Venezuelan Violence.