Survey shows drug trade filling Mexico's federal prisons
17 January 2013
The first ever survey of inmates in Mexico's federal penitentiaries paints a picture of a booming prison population fed by the drug trade, and a corrupt and unresponsive justice system.
According to the survey -- which sampled 726 men and 95 women and was done by the Centro de Investigacion y Docencia Economicas (CIDE) at the behest of the government (see pdf of report below) -- over 60 percent of these prisoners are in jail for drug trafficking crimes: transportation, local sale, sale in bulk, trafficking, pushing, possession, and consumption. An astounding 80 percent of the women jailed are in for drug crimes.
Read the full article here.
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