Costa Rica Crime – Muggings in San Jose

Between January and August the OIJ (Organismo de Investigación Judicial) registered 2,023 muggings committed in the capital city of San Jose. Although the police have succeeded in slowing down the number of muggings for short periods of time, the overall numbers do show an increase.

A slight decrease was noticed in February 2007, a few days after more police officers were assigned at the construction of a boulevard on Fourth Avenue. In May after another slight increase was detected, the Public Security Ministry sent to the streets 1,000 policemen and muggings decreased in June.

During year 2005 there were 4,535 and in 2006 there were 5,270 assaults in San Jose. This year there have been 2,023 up until August and 1,500 firearms were confiscated by the authorities from individuals with no permits to carry arms in San Jose, between January and August 2007..

Rafael Gutierrez, Vice Minister of Public Security said that there are not enough policemen. The former governments have not made very much about it. “Times change”, said Gutierrez.

“See history here: In 1856 Costa Rica had 156,000 inhabitants with 12,500 men available to join the police force. In 2007 there are 4.5 million people in Costa Rica, one million foreigners and we have 9,500 policemen,” said Gutierrez. They are doing studies to determine by region exactly what is lacking and where.

Gutierrez said that it is easier to patrol San José during the night when there is an estimated population of about 75,000 inhabitants. However, the logistics become very much bigger during the day time when 1,600,000 are coming come in and out by cars and buses.

The police know the criminals’ modus operandi and have distributed personnel on duty over the four main districts of San Jose. There is also a problem with people that never report the muggings because to them it was such a minor offense.

Rafael Arias who is in charge of Municipal Security in San Jose said that the fact that many police officers have police duties in other jurisdictions means that they can not maintain that increased police presence on a permanent basis.

He added that the municipal has a deficit of 2,000 million Colones to finance the Police force for the coming year. You can see the current rate of exchange at the Banco Nacional website here.

One of the biggest problems is that even though all perpetrators were taken to the tribunals last year, they remain on the streets.

Note From Scott Oliver – As you can clearly see from the geographical locations where the problems are the biggest, none of these areas are places where North Americans or European expats choose to live, in fact, very few expats choose to live anywhere in San Jose.

Our thanks to Carlos Arguedas C. and our friends at La Nación – Costa Rica’s largest Spanish circulation newspaper for their permission to summarize their articles in English.

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Andrew Makarik

to@welovecostarica.com

Andrew Makarik is the main editor of WeLoveCostaRica, a fan of this sunny country. He is also a loving husband and a has a lovely daughter. By being a devoted family man and the biggest Costa Rica fan, he wants to make more people feel at home there. WeLoveCostaRica unites people and helps them find new home or a new travel destination. This website is a friendly community where everyone can find not only information, but also new friends and travel pals. Andrew is also passionate about IT and programming, so he himself maintains a friendly atmosphere in this cozy environment of WeLoveCostaRica.com.