From La Prensa Grafica
By Suchit Chavez and Jessica Avalos
March 30, 2014
From testimonies of inhabitants, and many more corroborated sources, of the Northern Triangle (Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador), it is clear that police corruption is a part of daily society. Cops are bought off by the gangs. They give gangs the identities of witnesses and victims of crimes, who have come forward to the police seeking justice and help. Maybe 30%, maybe less of crimes are “solved” in the sense that the police know who committed them. However, closer to 2% of murders ever lead to actual convictions or sentences.
In 2013, there were 15,329 homicides in the Northern Triangle (which has a population of just around 30 million people in the 3 countries combined). Between 2011-2013, 48,947 people have been murdered. Due to the multitude of homicides, the area has stopped naming its victims, and appears to just number and accumulate them.
During those 3 years and almost 50,000 cases, only 2,295 cases have brought convictions – just over 5%. This leaves an impunity rate of 95%.