The lack of judges of Constitutional Guarantees forced the judiciary to improvise replacement judges.
On November 8, 2021, the The Assembly’s Comprehensive Security Commission established, in its Investigation Report on the Prison Crisis, that the Council of the Judiciary would be one of the State bodies responsible for the crisis that the country’s prisons are going through, specifically for the abuse of preventive prison and the lack of Judges of Penitentiary Guarantees and public defenders that process these processes.
Faced with this problem, the Judicial Council decided to “temporarily extend the jurisdiction of the judges of the Judicial Units of Criminal Guarantees, of Transit and Specialized in Violence Against Women or members of the Family nucleus, so that they know and resolve the causes that are in process in this penitentiary matter (…) ”.
For this, it will be designated 126 judges that, in addition, they will be in charge of processing cases of penitentiary guarantees in Azuay, Cotopaxi, Guayas and Manabí; provinces that, in addition, had only 19 judges specialized in Penitentiary Guarantees.
Several analysts consulted agree that this measure It is not only ‘impossible’ but also useless due to the lack of specialization of criminal judges in relation to Penitentiary Guarantees.
Nicolás Salas, criminal lawyer, highlights that Increasing the workload for traffic and family crime judges, who already have their competencies defined, would only aggravate the situation. “This it is not going to help the repressed requests of thousands of people deprived of liberty to be resolved in less time”, He comments and points out that an important area will be neglected to partially supply another area that is in crisis.
Lack of specialization of the judges
Another of the faults that is observed in this decision of the Judiciary has to do with the lack of specialization of assigned judges with regard to the prison system. On the one hand, because a judge specialized in Criminal Guarantees must have knowledge of criminology, victimology and victimology, according to Sebastián Cornejo, specialist in Criminal and Procedural Law.
On the other hand, because A judge specialized in this matter has the competence to monitor and be present in the Social Reclusion Centers (CRS) to verify that persons deprived of liberty (PPL) are protected in their rights.
The Organic Code of the Judicial Function determines that the Judges of Penitentiary Guarantees have the “competence for the substantiation of rights and guarantee of PPL with conviction ”.
That is to say, To ensure that what the law establishes is complied with, professionals must have in-depth knowledge of the process of judicial treatment of PPL because “it is the judge who is going to be aware of them, unlike a criminal judge who is going to hear the criminal process and sentence,” Cornejo details.
What the Assembly says
For Ramiro Narváez, president of the Assembly’s Comprehensive Security Commission, making this replacement, even if it is ‘temporary’, is physically and humanly impossible. “The president of the National Court of Justice, Iván Saquicela explained that the judges have accumulated processes and that, to evacuate everything they have, it would take them until December or more. Therefore, no more processes can be physically loaded”Narváez said, pointing out that María del Carmen Maldonado, president of the Council of the Judiciary, would have been present.
Defense of women’s rights
For Virginia Gómez, director of the Desafío Foundation, this is an unpresentable decision. Mention that in the area of violence against women they also removed prosecutors who deal with these issues.
“How can they put judges specialized in violence against women to deal with prison issues?”, Gómez is questioned and mentions that there are few. “The girls continue to be raped, pregnant and the State does not care,” he concludes.
Gómez also warned that after a meeting with the National Women’s Coalition, it will be analyzed to start a protective action before the Constitutional court. (MFU)
“19 judges of Penitentiary Guarantees are absolutely insufficient for a prison population of almost 30 thousand people deprived of liberty”, Nicolás Salas, criminal lawyer
“The thread always breaks at the thinnest part and, in this case, we are the women and the children”, Virginia Gómez, director of the Desafío Foundation.
14.726 PPL están sin sentencia.
A nivel nacional existen 734 defensores públicos.
