The Penitentiary Regime Directorate of Bolivia has denounced this Thursday that An inmate at the San Pedro prison in La Paz had a “project” ready to offer tourist visits inside that prison, a practice that was popular in the early years of this century and that, according to the authorities, was eradicated at the time.
The inmate had printed advertising flyers in English offering visits to that prison on Tuesdays and Sundays, with a WhatsApp number and a QR code, as shown to the media by the general director of the Penitentiary Regime, Juan Carloslíneas.
“This prisoner is already isolated. As appropriate, the prison authority, Colonel (Sergio) Sillerico, has called the Special Force to Fight Crime (Felcc) to open a new investigation regarding this situation. “, held.
The official stated that the inmate was imprisoned for murder for four years, was released and then was imprisoned again for a controlled substances case.
According to Cleans, the case is already investigated and Possible “accomplices” of the inmate are being sought inside and outside the prisonin addition to having “alerted” the tourism agencies regarding this advertising.
The director stressed that the entry of tourists to San Pedro “is not authorized”, so this offer was also “a potential scam” for foreigners arriving in Bolivia.
“In past years we had raised the issue of tours inside penitentiary centers as was the case before, because The San Pedro prison looked like a zoo“he noted.
Cleans asked people “not to be surprised” and insisted that “there is no authorization for tourism inside penitentiary centers, this entire situation has now been abolished.”
The San Pedro prison, which is only for men, has an open regime, that is, It does not have interior surveillance of its facilities and cells have been converted into homes for inmates who until 2018 could live in prison with their minor children.
At the end of the first decade of the 2000s, it was known that there were inmates who offered “tours” inside the San Pedro prison to travelers from other countries.
These visits were initially denied by the Police and the prison itself, but the Bolivian media then reproduced testimonies of foreigners who made the visit and who even talked about drug sales inside.
In March 2009, a television channel surprised dozens of tourists leaving the prison at night, which led to the restriction of visits by foreigners to the prison, in addition to the dismissal of its then governor.
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