Violence against drugs, escapes and a mirror in Alcatraz: what “La Roca” is like, the maximum security prison where Jorge Glas is imprisoned in Ecuador

The shadow of Alcatraz, the San Francisco prison born as a hermetic detention center and which ended up in legend after the famous escape in 1962, is projected onto the maximum security prison where Jorge Glas, the former vice-president of Ecuador, played by Daniel Noboa detained by the government while seeking asylum at the Mexican embassy in Quito. The Guayaquil complex inherited its name “The rock”. But instead of housing early 20th century gangsters, its cells contain stories of former officials, drug traffickers and escapes.

“This 6 April 2024, in compliance with the provisions issued by the competent judicial authority and, as part of a rigorous security operation coordinated together with the Armed Forces and the National Police, citizen Jorge G. was transferred to the Center for Deprivation of Freedom (CPL ). ) Guayas N° 3,” reported the National Global Attention Service for Adults Deprived of Liberty and Adolescent Offenders (SNAI) before midday.

Only two photos were known of his transfer to Complex 3, better known as “La Roca”. Glas appears in one handcuffed, with his eyes closed, his waist exposed and his legs half open, inside a military truck. In the other, already standing, high security personnel with camouflage clothing, helmets and their faces covered surround him.

Construction on The Rock began in 2006 to house high-profile prisoners. It was inaugurated in 2010, with one central objective: isolate the most dangerous criminals in the country. The same logic had guided its construction: even today little is known about how many prisoners there are and how they live.

But soon after becoming operational, “La Roca” proved its worth cracks in security.

Three months after its inauguration, the first escape attempt. In the years that followed, prisoners were shot and killed, even within their own cells. The first escape took place in February 2013: 19 inmates defeated 14 guards, snuck towards a river and escaped on board a boat where their accomplices were waiting for them.

In that group there was a 34-year-old man, leader of the Los Choneros group and sentenced in 2012 to 34 years in prison for drug trafficking, organized crime and murder. His name is Adolfo Macías Villamar. All of Ecuador already knew it “Fito”, the most dangerous criminal in the country, linked to the Sinaloa cartel. In recent months his fame has reached the continent.

Macías was transferred to a regional prison in Guayaquil. From there, last January, I had to return to La Roca. When they went to look for him in his cell, they did not find him. He had gone up in smoke. Since then, his whereabouts have remained a mystery. His traces reached Argentina, as his relatives moved to a town in Córdoba and then had to leave the country. But Fito is still a ghost.

That 2013 leak forced us to rethink strategy. The gates of La Roca they closed for a long time. It took almost ten years, after which the authorities reopened the complex with the guarantee of new security technologies, huge investments and the promise to honor the inherited nickname.

At the time, the prison had 189 places, according to the Ecuadorian website Plan V The number of prisoners would be reduced to 100. “Sadly famous criminal gang leaders”, as then president Guillermo Lasso defined them.

The Rock couldn’t handle his fame. On April 5, 2023, three people died and one was injured in a clash between prisoners, as social temperatures rose in Ecuador.

And in September a new incident highlighted security flaws. It happened when an explosives-laden drone landed on the prison roof and police launched an operation for a controlled explosion. Fito had returned to the place a few weeks earlier, but he was no longer there: they had taken him back to the regional prison of Guayaquil after the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio.

Due to the drone incident, they had to temporarily relocate the rest of the inmates.

Macías would return to La Roca on 7 January. But they didn’t find him that day and the rest is history.

Glas, sentenced to eight years in prison and also accused of embezzlement in the reconstruction of the province of Manabí (destroyed by an earthquake), will have famous company in that maximum security complex.

The newspaper The universe reported that among its 50 detainees there are former officials, relatives of current officials and even one accused of the Villavicencio crime: Pablo Muentes (former deputy of the Social Christian Party, one of the spaces that to date has ensured a governability pact for Noboa), Wilman Terán (former president of the Council of the Judiciary, detained for the Metastasi case), Carlos A. “Invisible” (he allegedly gave the order to kill Villavicencio) and Francisco Barreiro (son of the vice president Verónica Abad, in preventive detention for alleged influence peddling offer).