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Nicaragua Prison Conditions
The capacity of the Nicaraguan prison system was
greatly
expanded during the Sandinista period to keep pace with
the
incarceration of political prisoners. By the mid-1980s,
the
country had nine penitentiaries or public jails, holding
cells in
forty-eight local police stations, and some twenty-three
DGSE
detention centers. By the government's own estimate, there
were
5,000 prisoners in 1984, of whom 2,000 were National
Guardsmen or
others accused of cooperation with the Contras. An
independent
human rights group in Nicaragua, the Permanent Human
Rights
Commission, claimed in 1986 that 10,000 were incarcerated,
70
percent of whom were political dissidents. The
International
Committee of the Red Cross, which periodically visited
prisons,
counted more than 1,000 guardsmen and 1,500 others accused
of
pro-Contra activity in early 1988. An estimated 500 to 600
additional persons were in DGSE facilities. After the
release of
thirty-nine inmates in February 1990, no further political
prisoners were believed to be in Nicaraguan jails.
Under the Sandinistas, mistreatment and torture were
reported
to be common in the DGSE detention centers. The regular
penitentiaries and public jails were known for primitive
conditions and corruption emanating from the Prison
Directorate
under the Ministry of Interior. The largest penitentiary
at
Tipitapa outside Managua held most of the National
Guardsmen and
persons linked to the Contras. Tensions between inmates
and
guards were high, especially during peace talks, when
releases
appeared to be near. Heightened tensions were caused
primarily by
political prisoners who were unwilling to do work that
they
believed could help the Sandinista cause.
In late 1990, President Chamorro created a National
Penitentiary Commission to oversee and improve the penal
system.
A report issued by a human rights group in 1992 described
conditions in the national penitentiary system as
"disastrous."
The report accused the government of inexcusable
indifference
because it failed to allocate adequate funds. The
prisoners were
described as suffering from lack of food, clothing,
medicine, and
medical treatment. Cases of malnutrition were found as
well as
contaminated water. Although physical abuse in the
penitentiaries
was rare, a high percentage of prisoners complained of
torture
and mistreatment in police detention cells. As a
result of
drastic cutbacks in the judicial system's budget, more
than half
of the prisoners in 1993 were persons awaiting trial.
Data as of December 1993
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