Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0287/02870.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 25KB | 392 lines

$Unique_ID{COW02870}
$Pretitle{242}
$Title{Peru
Chapter 5C.   Crime and Punishment}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{James D. Rudolf}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{military
prisoners
government
prison
police
civil
code
1970s
penal
peruvian}
$Date{1980}
$Log{}
Country:     Peru
Book:        Peru, A Country Study
Author:      James D. Rudolf
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1980

Chapter 5C.   Crime and Punishment

Incidence of Crime

     Statistics showing annual crime rates were not published by the Peruvian
government, but estimates concerning crime in the country may be made from
occasional news reports and from tangential information. If overcrowding in
the prisons was used as a gauge, for example, the crime rate was high during
the 1970s even making allowances for periodic mass arrests of striking workers
or demonstrating students who, as political prisoners, often overloaded prison
facilities. As in many other countries the increasing incidence of crimes
involving juveniles had become a particular concern of the authorities during
the 1960s and 1970s.

     Crimes most frequently reported to the police included theft of
livestock, assault, rape, public drunkenness, disturbing the peace, and-to a
lesser extent than other categories-homicide. The theft of livestock was
reported to be an organized criminal activity and, at times, mounted units of
the Civil Guard pursued rustlers through the roadless areas of the Sierra (see
Glossary) where the crime was most prevalent.

     During the 1970s reports concerning traffic in illegal narcotics
increasingly appeared in Peruvian newspapers and magazines. In October 1972
the police announced the arrest of more than fifty drug traffickers and the
seizure of cocaine and marijuana valued at several million soles in a
successful conclusion to a long investigation of drug rings involving Peruvian
citizens and foreigners. Peru also joined Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama,
the United States, and Venezuela in a joint effort to crack down on the
international drug traffic. The PIP in 1976 appealed by radio broadcast for
assistance from the general public in combatting the sale of drugs to young
people. In August 1977 a United States congressman complained to an
investigating committee that 200 tons of cocaine were shipped from Peru and
Bolivia annually for destinations in the United States.

     Peru is the source for over half the world's supply of cocaine, and the
Peruvian government has become increasingly concerned over the potential of
the illicit cocaine traffic to corrupt the society. During the mid- and late
1970s the Civil Guard and the PIP had considerable success in breaking
smuggling operations and launched a campaign to stem the illegal cultivation
of the coca plant. The United States Drug Enforcement Administration has
worked closely with the Peruvian units, supplying training, equipment, and
financial support. A sign of Peru's determination to control drug trafficking
was the arrest of retired air force general Frank Tweddle Granda, who was
apprehended while carrying twelve pounds of cocaine onto a plane bound for
Miami.

     Civil Guard officials in early 1980 claimed that a 300-kilogram shipment
of cocaine had been intercepted in Loreto. According to police the coca plant
is grown in areas around Pucallpa, Tingo Maria, and Tarapoto, and the cocaine
is later shipped out of the country from the river port of Iquitos or more
commonly is smuggled out by air. In March 1980 a combined Civil Guard-army
operation aimed at the destruction of coca plantations was said to have met
with stiff resistance from the peasants growing the illegal crops,
particularly in Huanuco Department.

Penal Code

     The Penal Code used in early 1980 had been adopted in 1924, replacing
an older code; it had been considerably amended in the intervening years.
The four books of the code deal with general provisions, description of
felonies, description of misdemeanors, and application of punishment.
Felonies are divided into categories such as crimes against the person,
against the family, or against property; crimes against the state, against
public security, and against public order; and crimes involving moral
turpitude.

     A wide variety of punishments is provided in the code. The maximum
sentence is the death penalty, which is administered by firing squad. Until
the 1970s the death penalty was rarely used-between 1871 and 1971, according
to a common but possibly apocryphal story, only twelve men were executed. In
the early 1970s the military government began expanding the list of crimes for
which the death penalty could be adjudged, and in January 1973 the killing of
a police officer, killing during a robbery, and killing of a large number of
people were added to the list. During the next three years, seven men were
found guilty of killing policemen and were executed. The decree law stated
that a trial for the killing of a police officer was to be held in a military
court, was to be completed within forty-eight hours of its opening, and if
the accused were found guilty and sentenced to death, execution was to follow
within twenty-four hours of the judgment. There was no right of appeal to a
civilian court.

     An assassination attempt on December 1, 1974, against the prime minister,
Division General Edgardo Mercado Jarrin, led to a decree law two days later
authorizing the death penalty for persons convicted of acts of political
terrorism resulting in death or injury and authorizing minimum sentences of
twenty years for various other terroristic acts. The decree law stated that
for acts of political terrorism, "punishment must be drastic, the procedures
summary, and the execution of sentence immediate." As of early 1980 the death
penalty had not been adjudged for purely political crimes. The most recent
execution had been that of an air force sergeant convicted of spying (selling
pictures of Peruvian air bases to members of the Chilean embassy staff). He
was tried under the Code of Military Justice, and the case was reviewed by the
Supreme Military Tribunal. Article 235 of the 1979 Constitution states that
the death penalty can only be given for the crime of treason during a foreign
war. Article 282 adds that the Code of Military Justice cannot be applied to
civilians except in cases of treason. Other punishments include prison or jail
terms, deprivation of rights, loss of employment, suspension of employment,
and fines. The code also provides for probation and warnings.

     In addition to the Penal Code, which addresses itself primarily to
common crime, Peruvians during the period of military government were also
subject to various provisions of the Code of Military Justice and to trial by
military courts and Civil Guard courts. Such trials and the absence of the
right of appeal to civilian judicial authority were of particular concern to
advocates of constitutional government in Peru and to human rights activists
both within the country and abroad. After the mass arrests that occurred when
the government declared states of emergency to thwart the strikes and
demonstrations of the late 1970s, large numbers of civilians were brought
before Civil Guard courts to be tried on so-called political-social charges;
for example, Attack on the Armed Forces, which included resisting arrest, or
Insult to the Armed Forces, which generally meant slander or libel. In one
case on the latter charge, heard in a Civil Guard court in 1977, six
defendants were convicted and sentenced to serve several months in prison. On
appeal the convictions were overturned by the Supreme Court of Military
Justice, but the accused had already served their sentences.

     To opponents of the legal system, one of the particularly abhorrent
provisions of the Code of Military Justice permitted trial by military courts
of civilians who criticized military institutions; by logical extension
citizens were prohibited from criticizing their government, which was itself a
mi