“The problem that we have is a penitentiary system that’s out of control, in which many of the guards are involved”
Lara Loaiza writes in InSightCrime on the situation of women within the Guatemala carceral system. Corruption and criminality are rampant within the system and the number of women, as a percentage of the prison population, is rising.
Guatemalan authorities have made multiple busts of prison guards involved in sexual exploitation schemes that victimize women behind bars, showing rare government action on a problem that often remains hidden, and highlighting the challenge of battling corruption in the penitentiary system.
Police detained eight prison guards on August 16, alleging they sexually exploited female prisoners in the departments of Suchitepéquez, El Progreso, Baja Verapaz, and Guatemala. The guards charged male inmates money for transporting women to other prisons and forcing them to perform sexual acts, prisons director Sergio Vela told local media.
This case follows the arrest in March of nine guards who allegedly trafficked young girls into prisons, where they were sexually abused by inmates. Some of the male prisoners belonged to the Barrio 18 gang, and after abusing the girls they then made them carry out crimes outside the prison, according to reporting. The case was part of a broader investigation by a branch of the Attorney General’s Office focused on human trafficking (Unidad contra Estructuras Criminales y Casos Especiales de la Fiscalía contra la Trata de Personas). Another 2023 investigation found three other guards in Mazatenango, a mixed-gender prison, charged between $40 and $200 per girl.
Guatemala’s overcrowded prisons are hotspots of criminal activity, and corruption within prison staff is rampant. Both the Barrio 18 and the Mara Salvatrucha (MS13), who victimize women in trafficking schemes, have considerable power behind bars.
The number of women in prisons is rising, putting more women in conditions that make them vulnerable to sexual exploitation and abuse. In 2015, women represented 9.1% of the total prison population in Guatemala. By 2023, that number had increased to 12.1%. Most female inmates are aged between 18 and 35, said Andrea Barrios, who runs Colectivo Artesanas, a non-governmental organization that advocates for the rights of women in prison in Guatemala.
You can read the full piece, with links, here Arrests Shed Light on Abuse of Women in Guatemala’s Prisons.
Categories: Corruption, Criminalisation, Gender, Guatemala, Human Rights, Justice, Violence
Guatemala Solidarity Network 
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