source: nacla
A Salvadoran court opened proceedings Monday against 486 alleged MS-13 gang members who are being collectively charged with more than 47,000 crimes between 2012 and 2022. If convicted on charges that include homicide, femicide, arms trafficking, and extortion, the defendants could face sentences of up to 245 years. Since a 2023 reform to the country’s penal code authorized mass trials, human rights experts have warned that detainees’ due process rights are being violated—a concern echoed at the time even by the U.S. State Department. In previous mass trials, anonymous judges handed down identical sentences to all defendants, an outcome that observers expect will be repeated in this case. The majority of the defendants are currently being held at the notorious Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), a maximum-security prison plagued by allegations of torture and abusive conditions, from which they watched the hearing by video link. Even as criticism of El Salvador’s prison system has mounted, right-wing President Nayib Bukele has moved to intensify his crackdown, signing into law last week a constitutional reform enabling life sentences for children as young as 12.
