According to data from the Eastern Metropolitan Regional Prosecutor’s Office, between January and July of this year a total of 1,117 door locks or locks in the nine communes that are under that jurisdiction. And among them, according to the detail, Florida concentrates the highest number of events, with 296 cases. For this reason, the communal authorities are taking a series of measures, including a provision that will allow the residents of that municipality to have a “Attorney for the people”.
This was reported in conversation with The Third PM Mayor Rodolfo Carter, who was emphatic in arguing that the dilemma is not being faced as the citizens require and demand, so together with reinforcing provisions at the local level, he asks for a paradigm shift and that the matter be taken seriously. And it is that he looks with astonishment and concern at the 101% increase in slamming doors and lock-ins registered in Florida, if the period January-July 2021 is compared with January-July 2022.
| common | January-Christmas 2019 | January-Christmas 2020 | January-Christmas 2021 | January-Christmas 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Florida | 308 | 430 | 147 | 296 |
| Penalolen | 182 | 160 | 92 | 202 |
| the brave | 86 | 86 | 63 | 164 |
| Ñuñoa | 115 | 92 | 71 | 157 |
| Vitacura | 166 | 120 | 60 | 120 |
| Providence | 108 | 59 | 47 | 91 |
| The Counts | 60 | 51 | 26 | 70 |
| The Queen | 52 | 37 | 28 | 63 |
| Lo Barnechea | 9 | 10 | 4 | 14 |
| Total FRMO: | 1.086 | 1.045 | 538 | 1.177 |
“Anything that can be done at the municipal level cannot be compared to the great change that is required in terms of crime. As long as we have a criminal procedure system that works like this, there is no possibility. We can have 10,000 more carabineros, more luminaries, but we don’t get anything, because it is the courts that have to change their gaze and focus on the victims“, said the community chief.
In that sense, he explained that “the prosecutor” that they will hire will be a lawyer who will be at the service of the person who is the victim of a crime of high connotation, since in his opinion, that citizen today has no guarantees that his interests prevail. “The prosecutor of the Public Ministry is not the lawyer of the victims, he represents the State, therefore, when the prosecutor reaches an agreement with the court or the defense, he does not always think of the victims,” he added.
He added, in the same tone, that with the formula that they will soon be able to put into practice, they intend to show “that the great revolution of the system is to shift the focus from the criminal to the victim. That only changes with a lawyer who works for the victims, that will be the people’s prosecutor.”
In parallel, Carter also asks that the central government also take greater decisions, especially in the face of the work done by the police. “We have dissatisfied police officers, without quality intelligence and with weapons that are less effective than those of criminals. _We are facing not only crimes, but also people who delight in suffering. Today the culture of death is prevailing, humiliating, mistreating, and in the face of that we have a Chilean State seeing crime the same as in the ’80s“, held.
“We are spending what we don’t have on this. We spend $500 million to complement the Carabineros response, but we find that they have less and less staff, they are less respected. So what kind of carabinero do we have in the streets? Weakened, because today in Chile insulting and assaulting a police officer is free, ”she emphasized.
In addition to the “People’s Prosecutor”, in Florida they are promoting other tools with a view to enhancing security, aiming that the problem be faced decisively from the central government.
It requests, in this sense, the creation of a municipal fund at the national level “that allows improving the technical training of security officials” and the rehiring of retired Carabineros personnel to fulfill functions of community police, approach to neighbors and administrative tasks, so as -as they mention- “release contingent for the prosecution of crimes.”
Similarly, from the municipality they propose to end what they call a kind of “state scholarship” for the soccer clubs and large production companies that organize sporting and cultural events, and that they be the ones who finance their security and free the Carabineros for other critical functions.
Also, Mayor Carter’s plan includes the idea of presenting “a bill that set the compliance with effective punishment to its maximum degree for those who commit crimes of greater social connotation such as homicides, robberies with intimidation or injuries, and crimes related to drug trafficking, among others, and those who are repeat offenders cannot opt for prison benefits.”
As a fifth point, the communal chief also promotes that there be a actual compliance with effective sentences once morest those who commit ill-treatment of Police officers or members of the PDI resulting in death or injury. Additionally, it requests that the Effective criminal responsibility is from the age of 16“considering that, for example, the Constitutional Convention approved that the vote be from that age, for which consequence must be demanded between the rights and the duties of citizenship.”
Finally, Carter proposes that broaden and increase the severity of the penalties of the anti-barricade and anti-looting laws“so that those who damage public infrastructure, cause violence, looting, shootings or block roads, preventing the free movement of people, serve effective sentences.”
