Why Are So Many More Gang Members Suddenly Dying in El Salvador’s Prisons?

Germán Orlando Escobar was skinny but strong. Every day he worked with his hands, planting vegetables in the fields or helping out in the mill. So when he died from a buildup of fluid in the lungs one month after entering prison, his family was shocked. 

Escobar is among dozens of alleged gang members arrested in El Salvador who have died under questionable circumstances since President Nayib Bukele declared a state of emergency in late March to crack down on the notorious MS-13 and Barrio 18 street gangs, which have long controlled vast swaths of the country and driven record homicide rates.

Since then, Salvadoran authorities have arrested more than 55,000 people in the tiny country, often on flimsy evidence or the existence of tattoos, which for years were considered a telltale sign of gang membership.

Bukele’s decree gives police free rein to arrest people without evidence, prohibits freedom of assembly, and denies citizens the right to legal counsel. Escobar was accused of murder but never charged in court. The Central American nation’s prison system has become completely opaque. Family visits to most inmates are barred, as is access to the media or human rights organizations. Escobar’s family learned of his death from the funeral home, according to his sister, Marta Escobar, who said they had no idea he had been sick or taken to a hospital. 

Cristosal, a Salvadoran human rights group, has documented the deaths of at least 83 inmates in the eight months since the crackdown began. They include women and men, young and old. Ninety-four inmates died in the 14 months before the state of emergency, according to government data.  

“The overpopulation in the prisons and the capacity of prison officials has provoked a series of violent situations,” said Zaira Navas, a lawyer with Cristosal. “It’s inevitable that these deaths are occurring.”

Bukele’s spokeswoman, Wendy Ramos, didn’t respond to a request for government figures about prison deaths. The Associated Press reported that the information will not be released for seven years, citing authorities. 

Escobar’s sister, Marta, said her family was given a piece of paper that said her brother died from pulmonary edema, a condition that causes too much fluid to build up in the lungs. Heart problems usually cause the condition, according to the Mayo Clinic, but it can also be caused by “trauma to the chest wall” and contact with certain toxins. Marta said the paper indicated that an autopsy was forthcoming, but authorities never gave her more information. Investigations into inmates’ deaths fall to the attorney general, but they rarely lead anywhere.

A source who works for the government said inmates were dying “daily” when the state of emergency began eight months ago. Some of the deaths stemmed from chronic diseases, the source said, but others appeared to stem from mistreatment and lack of medical attention. The source, who asked to withhold their name because they didn’t have authorization to speak on the record, said they had requested the inmates’ autopsies but didn’t have time to pick them up.  

“These are not new cases,” the source said. “We are saturated with homicide cases and haven’t had time to pick up the documents. I imagine they’re ready.” 

Bukele is very popular in El Salvador despite what critics say is a long record of violating human rights and repressing critical media. In April, he pushed through a law that authorizes prison sentences of 10 to 15 years for journalists that “disseminate” gangs’ messages. In practice, critics say it’s an effort to squash reporting that has revealed the president’s efforts to negotiate with gang leaders in order to quell violence.

Still, murders have plunged since Bukele imposed the state of emergency, and many Salvadorans say they feel safer than they have in years.  

Bukele recently declared his intention to run for a second term, although the Salvadoran Constitution explicitly prohibits presidents from running for consecutive terms. 

Israel Rodríguez said he appreciates that Bukele is taking a hard line against the country’s powerful gangs, which have metastasized across the northern triangle countries of El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala in the last two decades. Like many Salvadorans, Rodríguez has been personally affected by the country’s endemic violence—gang members killed his brother and a nephew around 2010, he said.

In April, shortly after Bukele imposed the state of emergency, police arrested another one of his nephews as he was buying groceries and accused him of belonging to a gang, Rodríguez said. There was no basis to the allegations, Rodríguez said, adding that his nephew, Mauricio Rodríguez, 50, was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

In October, Mauricio alerted a family member that he was sick and in the hospital. Rodríguez visited and saw him handcuffed to the bed with a large bandage across his midsection. The police had beaten him severely in the abdomen when he was arrested and he’d never recovered, Rodríguez said his nephew told him.  

“He told me that he probably wasn’t going to make it,” Rodríguez said.

They only talked briefly; Rodríguez said a guard returned and demanded to know why he was there, as his nephew wasn’t allowed visitors. 

“I got the chills because as things are today, the way the law is, they can arrest you for anything.” 

Rodríguez managed to leave the hospital. His nephew died two days later.

Bukele has defended his hard-line practices and, in an interview this week with Fox’s Tucker Carlson, pointed to his strong approval ratings.

“People seem to like what we are doing,” he said.