Jose Sanchez
Research expert covering society, economy, & politics for Latin America
Crime in El Salvador – statistics & facts
During 2016, El Salvador recorded one of the most violent years in the country's history with over 5,000 recorded homicides, one of the highest rates in the world. Since that year, the number of cases started to decline constantly. Eight years later the country ranked as the Latin American country with the lowest murder rate. Nonetheless, the transition to peace has not been an easy one, El Salvador once dominated by fear and violence encountered several problems and still has many barriers to overcome to truly achieve sustainable peace.
The state of terror was mainly brought by two rival gang organizations, La Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and Mara Barrio-18. Both organizations had control over several municipalities and territories who were considered out of reach of any security institutions such as the police or military. Enabling many violent episodes and continued fear from the inhabitants of those regions. Both organizations share a common place of origin in Los Angeles during the 80s and 60s, respectively, becoming known for their crimes regarding extortion, drug trafficking, human trafficking, kidnapping, money laundry, among many others. Another common characteristic is the use of tattoos to denote rank, gang membership, and other distinctions, which has been used by the police and military to accelerate the capture of gang members.
For that same reason, Bukele’s government started building the Terrorism Confinement Center (Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo or “CECOT”). Which was built as a maximum-security prison in 2022 in the municipality of Tecoluta and has an approximate capacity for 40,000 inmates. The CECOT ranks as one of the largest prisons in the world, but still prison overcrowding is a problem for the Central American country. Nonetheless, El Salvador had reduced its occupancy rate to 160 percent, from over 237 percent, and leaving the top ten Latin American countries with the highest rates.
Who much does crime and violence cost to El Salvador?
The economic impact of violence is defined as the costs and effects a country has as a direct result of dealing, preventing, and containing violence. Due to the recent history of crime, El Salvador ranked as the Central American country with the second-highest cost of violence as a share of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In total, the economic cost was around 10 percent of the total monetary value of all final goods and services produced within the country. In terms of costs per capita, it ranked third in the region with almost 1,500 U.S. dollars per inhabitant, only behind Panama and Costa Rica.A short history of gang activity in El Salvador
During an especially violent couple of days in March 2022, El Salvador’s government declared the “exception regime” (Regimén de excepción) to counter and control gang activity and homicides, with the intention of putting an end to the state of terror. During the early days of the regime, around 75 percent of the population felt safe with the new state of emergency. Even in early 2024, the approval rate of president Bukele was among the highest in the world, winning the 2024 elections of El Salvador with over 80 percent of the votes. The massive popularity of the president has a clear debt to the effectiveness of the measures put in place.The state of terror was mainly brought by two rival gang organizations, La Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and Mara Barrio-18. Both organizations had control over several municipalities and territories who were considered out of reach of any security institutions such as the police or military. Enabling many violent episodes and continued fear from the inhabitants of those regions. Both organizations share a common place of origin in Los Angeles during the 80s and 60s, respectively, becoming known for their crimes regarding extortion, drug trafficking, human trafficking, kidnapping, money laundry, among many others. Another common characteristic is the use of tattoos to denote rank, gang membership, and other distinctions, which has been used by the police and military to accelerate the capture of gang members.
Massive incarcerations and the new maximum-security prison
The war against crime heavily impacted the incarceration rate of El Salvador, becoming the country with the largest prison population per 100,000 inhabitants. In total, more than 1,600 per every 100,000 inhabitants were incarcerated in the Central American country, thrice the number recorded by the United States. In 2020, the prison population was lower than 37,000 inmates, the number of prisons and their conditions was less than optimal for this new chapter.For that same reason, Bukele’s government started building the Terrorism Confinement Center (Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo or “CECOT”). Which was built as a maximum-security prison in 2022 in the municipality of Tecoluta and has an approximate capacity for 40,000 inmates. The CECOT ranks as one of the largest prisons in the world, but still prison overcrowding is a problem for the Central American country. Nonetheless, El Salvador had reduced its occupancy rate to 160 percent, from over 237 percent, and leaving the top ten Latin American countries with the highest rates.
