El Infierno by Pieter Tritton

Author:Pieter Tritton
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ebury Publishing

CHAPTER TWENTY

EXODUS

IN JANUARY 2007, when I had been in prison for nearly eighteen months, Ecuador’s newly elected president, Rafael Correa, took office. In his election campaign, he had promised to introduce various prison and law reforms in an attempt to sort out a system that had essentially come to a standstill.

The prison system had been placed in a state of emergency, thus giving the president executive powers. He reintroduced automatic release on bail if not sentenced within one year of arrest; the reintroduction of two for one, which basically meant you were released automatically after having served half of your sentence; and the reactivation of the pre-libertad system, which was akin to early release on parole – this could be applied for after having served two fifths of the total sentence.

The most important change for us foreigners was the introduction of the badly needed indulto, or presidential pardon, which was one of the very first things Correa did having gained power. The indulto would apply to anyone, foreign or national, who was captured with two kilograms and under of any drug, be it heroin, cocaine, cannabis or ecstasy. It would mean immediate release for those to whom it was applicable. Many foreigners would benefit from this and everyone was eagerly waiting to see if they might be able to go free much sooner than they had anticipated.

For the indulto to apply you had to be sentenced and the sentence had to be confirmed and executed. You couldn’t be making any sort of appeal or awaiting repatriation. You had to have served ten per cent of the sentence and be a first time offender. The indulto only ran for one month and if you missed the time limit that was it. The lawyers were having a field day processing applications, charging anything from $200–$1,500 to complete the paperwork and file the application in the court. There was some flexibility with conditions such as the weight limit, as long as there were a few banknotes to back your word up. An example would be if the police had weighed the drugs in the packaging or wrappers. I saw a few cases where people had drugs weighing a total of 2,200 grams but still managed to get the indulto by saying the extra weight over the two kilograms was due to the packaging – and of course paying the judge.

I discussed with Eva the possibility of my being released on the indulto. In my case there were no drugs weighed as they were impregnated in the groundsheet of the tent. The police had weighed the whole tent instead of extracting the drugs, which I had wanted to do myself. If I had extracted the drugs and not listened to Eva then I would have gone free with the indulto after only two years as I knew there was less than two kilograms of cocaine within the rubber. But by this point the tent had been destroyed so it was no longer possible. I felt sick knowing that I was legally eligible to go free but couldn’t.

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