La Carcel/“El Pueblito” (common name) is the state penitentiary for Baja California. It is located in La Mesa within a well-populated area of city. It is considered by the staff to be a maximum-security prison, and by Mexican standards, may be the maximum amount of security they are willing/able to provide for the inmates inside surrounding population. Security is low-tech, men with machine guns, high walls, and no technologically sophisticated surveillance equipment or check-points. The prison takes up approximately two city blocks, containing some cell-blocks and office buildings, a playing field for soccer/baseball, and a large area of shack like dwellings, some reaching three of four stories, where the majority of the inmates reside. Over 6000 inmates reside in la carcel, about 180 of whom are women. La carcel was built to house only 2000 people, with a maximum of 6 per cell. Currently, cells house at least 15 people, and cages are supposedly being built so that people can sleep more comfortably standing up. While en route to the psychologists office, I walked straight through part of the general population, after having been told not to make eye contact, to keep my purse underneath my jacket, and to walk quickly. To my left, as I was walking, were hundreds of loud, frustrated, and emaciated people literally pressed tightly together and nearly on top of one another, against a very tall metal fence. I noticed a small group of table vendors in the background amongst the small walkways created in between the shacks. Along the southern side of La Carcel is a large open sewer, an old fashioned mote really, filled with lots of blue chemicals. La Carcel has no underground plumbing or outside pipes, I was told, so the sewage sits in the chemicals right on the ground until it “dissolves”. This place looks more like an internment camp than a prison only 10 miles from the US – Mexico Border.

La carcel is called El Pueblito because it allows families to reside alongside of the inmates. It is the only one in Mexico where this is allowed. This means that non-incarcerated women and children live with the inmate population, on the one hand providing psychological and emotional and physical support (laundry, cleaning, cooking), and on the other hand providing a large population of prey for sexual and otherwise violent offenders and a generally horrid atmosphere for a child to grow up in. La Carcel is one of three places where people get sent when they commit a crime, the other two are Consejo Tutelar de Menores (a juvenile prison), and Carcel Municipal (what used to be the city jail but is now used to house newly incarcerated female inmates and known murderers awaiting their trip to Al Molya (another higher security prison located in another state in Mexico. The municipal jail is considered the worst place to end up, as it is very dark without windows, much like the Tijuana jail of legend. One of the primary problems with El Pueblito according to the staff psychologist (outside of its living conditions), is that there is no classification system according to type of crime. There are Americans incarcerated in La Carcel, as small-time drug offenders are sent to the same place as violent offenders in Tijuana. My tourguide (a prison guard) later that afternoon told me that he has many schoolmates and friends incarcerated in La Carcel, and I have found out since then that many people here have friends and family members who have lived there at least once in their life.

HIV/AIDS notes:
Brief intake exam by a psychologist (No HIV test).
More thorough exit exam by the psychologist (still no HIV test).
HIV exams are not mandatory (thus no stats on HIV or other STDs among prison population).
Prevention education is available by one psychologist on staff who can provide individual counseling, condoms and brochures on request, among her many other duties as the only psychologist serving over 6000 inmates.
HIV tests are supposed to be “available” and free upon request, however, there are no resources to give said exams (used to receive financial and lab support from the public general hospital but don’t at this time).
Tests have really only been done in the past when someone self reports HIV+ status or has AIDS.
There is currently no treatment or medication for people with AIDS outside of treatment of common medical problems (TB, etc.) and there are no medical personnel on staff who specialize in AIDS related illnesses.
There is no needle exchange or bleach kits distribution, and injected drug use is very common among the population.

Due to a complete lack of resources, an HIV prevention program in the form of peer outreach and education is in the works, Friday May 4th was the day we were supposed to have the formal presentation of this program to the Secretariat of health for the state of Baja. The presentation and health fair was cancelled/“rescheduled” for a future date as yet undecided. Spent one day with the peer outreach workers (all inmates) and the “asesores” (health workers in charge of organizing workshops and obtaining certificates for participating volunteers). Inmates stated they had plenty of time to learn and teach others, but had concerns about how their new skills might be used once released from prison (rightly so). Inmates will receive certificates stating their completion of health workshops and letters of recommendation from the state, but no formal job counseling or placement, and were told there was little chance they would obtain paid employment in the health field given their records (most outreach workers in the general community are volunteers). Outreach workers will receive special training in other areas of general concern in Tijuana, such as tuberculosis, family planning, nutrition, hygiene, emergency medical education, substance abuse, and violence. Each outreach worker will specialize in one of the previous areas and it is hoped that their own status as inmates will facilitate trust and eliminate the social barriers between health workers and the target population (an interesting study would be the social effects and changes that might arise as a result of this program). The program itself is to become legal and state supported so that the program will be less vulnerable to changes in the administration within La Carcel.

After my initial visit to El Pueblito, especially having been honored as the only outsider allowed to witness the prison and participate in the HIV planning committee, I volunteered to help with the organization of the event planned for May 4th. This event, had it happened, would have been the very first time a large sized group of civilians (including health officials and the media) would have received permission to access El Pueblito. I made hundreds of red AIDS ribbons and name badges for the event participants, and though this took me a few hours each evening this week, I feel sick inside, and completely overwhelmed by what I saw. HIV testing and assessment might help generate international funding dollars for HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment services in the long term, but it is obviously no help to inmates as they have zero services and such a poor quality of life in general that food, shelter, and other basic needs are far more significant needs. What can I as a student do about what I saw other than write about it and hope that someone, somewhere, will be embarrassed enough, enlightened enough, or inspired enough to do SOMETHING. I have seen hell, and no – they wouldn’t let me take any pictures.

TJR - Do you feel the said event was "rescheduled" as an effort NOT to draw attention to La Pueblita and its conditions? In other words, never would be permitted by the powers that be.