The murder of a Chilean police officer on Thursday, the third in 23 days, hit once more the government of President Gabriel Boric, whose main problem is a crime wave.
The increase in violent crimes is a headache for the president, who, following the murder of a second police officer at the end of March, agreed with Congress to speed up the processing of a series of bills on security that have been stalled for months in the Legislature.
A few hours following Congress approved a bill to protect police officers who use their weapons in situations of imminent danger to their lives or those of third parties, criminals shot an agent in the head.
After attending the wake of the murdered agent, Boric announced an increase of 1,500 million dollars a year, which will be added to the security budget, to reinforce the protection of the police with more secure equipment.
He added that he asked the police to present and put into practice a plan to reinforce the security of its members. “We are going to take care of those who take care of us,” he said.
The national chief of the uniformed police, General Ricardo Yáñez, reiterated on the verge of tears his “enough already” of police murders. The impact on the institution was also reflected by another general, Alex Chaban, who refused to speak to the press if among them was a journalist who referred to the police as “pacos”, a derogatory way of referring to them. He finally made statements.
The prosecutor’s office investigating the latest murder released photographs of two foreigners “of criminal interest” in the case. Coincidentally, the national prosecutor Ángel Valencia declared that the Public Ministry of the Chilean capital will request the preventive detention of all foreigners who are detained and do not have a Chilean identity card.
Boric promulgated on Thursday the law on the use of weapons by the police and three others that increase sentences for the crimes of extortion, kidnapping and carrying weapons in highly crowded places. The rules will come into force following a couple of red tape.
The law referring to weapons needs a protocol that will establish the situations in which they can be used, which will enter Congress next week for approval, anticipated the Minister of the Interior, Carolina Tohá.
Until now, police officers who used their weapons in acts of duty once morest serious crimes were immediately investigated by the Public Ministry, suspended from their duties and did not receive their salaries.
The enactment of the law was a blow to the Communist Party and the leftist Broad Front, Boric’s closest political coalition, which voted once morest it and planned to challenge it in the Constitutional Court.
The centre-right opposition does not miss an opportunity to remind the authorities of its severe criticism of the police in the recent past. The most severe trials were heard following the police repression of the protests that followed a social outbreak in 2019 when there were massive human rights violations, according to coincident international organizations.
“It is worth reflecting on our performances in the past,” Boric said at the end of March.
Other measures announced by the government in the last month are the improvement of bulletproof vests, deterrent equipment and the mandatory use of body cameras. The latter is not fulfilled because there are not enough, Tohá said.
He added that a police intervention plan will be anticipated in some thirty communes where the largest number of violent crimes are recorded.
Boric’s approval has suffered a persistent decline, according to several surveys in which more than two-thirds of those consulted mentioned crime as their main concern.
According to official figures, last year crime grew by 44% compared to 2021. Among the crimes that increased the most are robbery with violence, surprise and homicides.
Chile / With information from AP
