Crime in Costa Rica

[1] Sebastian Huhn reports that, "In a public opinion poll in 2011, 45 percent of Costa Rican respondents said that crime and insecurity were the country’s biggest social problems.

Cases of Arancha Gutiérrez and María Trinidad Mathus, both occurring in August 2018, are the most recent examples of tourists suffering from the rise in criminal activity.

[6] Similarly, in case of Arancha Gutiérrez, the man suspected and linked to the assault was released without any charges, and was transferred to the custody of the immigration police for being in the country illegally.

[7] "The nation of about five million people, still regarded as being one of the safest as compared to others in Central America, saw 603 homicides last year, according to preliminary data from the police service responsible for investigating them.".

Costa Rica's maritime jurisdiction is more than 11 times the size of its land mass,[11] rendering it even more difficult to police and monitor trading activity.

[14] In March and April 2011, it was reported that nine Guatemalans who were linked to Mexican drug trafficking organisations were detained at the Paso Canoas and Peñas Blancas border crossings.

[16] Lack of resources and defence has been recognized by the government as the key factor in the inability to prevent and weaken the amount of drug trafficking that is occurring in Costa Rica.

[16] The Chamber of Commerce officials in Puntarenas outlined that the drug cartels have come to portray themselves as fishing businesses and use strategies of coercion, either with or without weaponry or by paying other fisherman, to get the illicit substances on land.

Discourse around crime rates in Costa Rica progressed throughout the late 1990s in an emotive manner and became more evident through the change in leadership, most notably through presidents Figueres, and Rodríguez.

"The action against crime has made it necessary to expand the capacity of the prisons.... To restore tranquility and seguridad ciudadana it will be essential to reform legislation, to help the police fight criminals and to avoid impunity...

I therefore ask you with humility and vehemence to answer those demands by passing these laws without delay"Academics highlight that the perception of crime and its prevalence was to an extent manufactured by the government as a means to support the strict legislation that they put in place.

These include the size of the police force, lack of resources, adequate training, especially for security matters that extended beyond their normal jurisdictions and fragmentation among organisations.

[21] In an interview with the New York Times, it was reported by the coast guards in Puntarenas that they lacked adequate boating equipment to stop and search most of the skiffs that cross the waters.

[24] This aided in creating an infrastructure for governments to detect illicit materials and increase responsiveness of certain maritime ports, which was the core aim of the Container Control Program.

[25] In 2017, the Costa Rican Drug Institute (Instituto Costarricense sobre Drogas, ICD) hosted the first meeting of the working group of Latin American countries which was aimed at establishing a criterion on prevention.