Inmates training in the Penitentiary Center of the Andean Region, in Mérida, Venezuela. Photo: EFE/Cristian Hernandez/File photo.
On Monday, February 13, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro announced that Celsa Bautista was appointed minister for the penitentiary service, replacing Mirelys Contreras.
Mirelys Contreras was appointed minister in 2020 and was part of the team that created the current Venezuelan penitentiary system, set in motion by former minister Iris Varela in 2011.
Through social media, President Maduro wrote that the “construction of a prison system with broad respect for human rights” will continue with the appointment of Vice Admiral Celsa Bautista.
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“I appointed Vice Admiral Celsa Bautista as Minister of Popular Power for Penitentiary Service so that with her experience, the construction of a penitentiary system with broad respect for human rights continues. I thank Mirelys Contreras for her work at the head of this office,” wrote Maduro.
Designé a la V/A Celsa Bautista como Ministra del Poder Popular para el Servicio Penitenciario, para que con su experiencia continúe la construcción de un sistema penitenciario de amplio respeto a los DDHH. Agradezco a Mirelys Contreras por su labor al frente de este despacho. pic.twitter.com/c5iAGpgdDW
— Nicolás Maduro (@NicolasMaduro) February 13, 2023
Vice Admiral Celsa Bautista
Vice Admiral Bautista has served as director general of the human resources office of the Ministry for Interior Relations, Justice and Peace. Minister Remigio Ceballos appointed her to this position on September 22, 2021, as published in Official Gazette.
Bautista also served as general director of social assistance at the Ministry of the Office of the Presidency and Monitoring of Government Management in 2012.
She has also been Military, Naval and Air Attaché to the Venezuelan Embassies in Ecuador, Belgium and the Netherlands.
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The Ministry for the Penitentiary Service
The Ministry for the Penitentiary Service was created by then-President Hugo Chávez on July 26, 2011. He had previously commented on it to Eleazar Díaz Rangel, director of Últimas Noticias, which published several reports about the beating of several inmates detained in the CICPC-El Rosal, resulting in the deaths of Pedro Rivero, William Pérez and Rubén Arnal.
In May 2012, the then-deputy director of the CICPC, Albis Pinto, told journalists that the three inmates had died from drug withdrawal. However, a witness interviewed by Últimas Noticias refuted that story, saying he had heard the three inmates being beaten with a bat, two of whom died near him while the third died at the Domingo Luciani hospital in El Llanito.
Two months after this event, Chávez swore in Iris Varela as minister of the penitentiary service with the duty to create a new penitentiary system in Venezuela. Meanwhile, six CICPC agents were prosecuted for the murder of Rivero, Pérez and Arnal.
(Últimas Noticias) by Janna Corredor/Eligio Rojas with Orinoco Tribune content
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/JRE/SF
