QCOSTARICA BLOGS – Almost all the news, both published and on television, has focused on the epidemic of crime in Costa Rica. Instead of going away, according to media it is exponentially growing in the south, in the north and especially inland and the canton of San Jose.
While some pundits did in fact predict and found organized crime early on, be it young folks or hardened criminals, the results are shocking.
According to the OIJ, our answer to the FBI, 80% of all drug-related arrests,“walk” free, go unpunished. The 80% freedom rate is a simple invitation to “do business.” A 20% failure to convict rate is far better than restaurants, travel agencies and small manufacturing businesses which have each succumbed to the Costa Rica market place.
As a neophyte, Costa Rica has already begun its transition from a country unscathed by Central American violence to a “player” in this awful, horrific organized environment of the heavy-duty drug trafficking, well-armed gangs who use deadly force in shootouts and control of neighborhoods with hit men murders.
We await only the formal initiation into the infamous triangle, El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala.
If the government of Costa Rica does not clamp down on crime, all crime, we are assured of becoming a killing field in less than a year, just like our neighbors to the north.
The latest folly is not allowing our ally, The U.S., to land and refuel its planes in order to patrol the waters on both coasts. It’s a national and sad joke which once again complicates the values of our nation.
The Cosa Rican complexity to obtain refueling privileges, or anything else for that matter 1. Invites the Chapo type cartels 2. The running of drugs up the coast with a wink of an eye approval of lawmakers 3. A good, solid income from each refueling that we very much need.
We hear reports not just from San Jose, but from bucolic communities such a Tiliban, Nosara, San Carlos, Osa Peninsula of violent armed home invasions, exaggerated drug running and vengeance killings not to mention gang wars claiming “turf” dominance.
Mr. President, many people of this beautiful country are scared.We, the people, are leaving, not coming to settle in Costa Rica, business is abandoning Costa Rica and while the costs are a large part, so is fear.
The inefficiency that has for such a long time prevented this country from expanding, the duplication of authority and need to always consult our Sala Cuarta 4 Supreme Court for every detail, the slowness of the judicial system and endless debate on every legal proposal have e created the Perfect Storm for big time organized crime, no less than the infamous triangle Honduras, el Salvador and Guatemala to step in as caretakers while we banter away what is right, wrong and protected by law.
In Florida, there has been a saying, “When up to your ass in alligators, that is not the time to think about draining the swamp.”
In Costa Rica, that is exactly our time.
For a President who publically exposed his ignorance as to how the banking system operates in his “economic stimulation” address to the Nation last Sunday, in his suggesting that, “out of the blue” the banks could lower the interest rate for loans by two percentage points to stimulate domestic business investment, I doubt that any practical reform of the administration of justice can be expected from this Government; their ineptitude is complete.
The most classic example of inefficiency in the legal system was the case where the park ranger shot a man that was attacking him after he was stopped for poaching. The end result is the park ranger was sentenced to prison. So how well are the police going to address the criminal activities when they are being punished for doing their job?
Drug arrests are not doing much other than filling the courts with an endless stream of paperwork only for the criminal to walk free, so why bother to arrest anyone involved with the drug trade? Sure does appear that there is a fix in the system to protect the criminals instead of the law abiding citizens.
Home invasions are rising and the citizens are not allowed to own weapons that would protect their families, but the criminals carry fully automatic weapons with no recourse.
This is surely a method to slow down or stop tourist traffic as well as any business that might consider moving here.
There was also a bloody home invasion in the quiet location of Sta. Gertrudis N., Calle La Arena, last Navidad. This was just a couple months after several of us residentes noticed 3 strange men with 2 pitbulls walking through the area. They ‘felt’ very wrong. I don’t know if the perps were ever caught…