[Roberto Valencia, Letter from Zacatraz. Libros del K.O. Madrid, 2018. 384 pp.]

review / Jimena Villacorta

The story of El Directo – a young Salvadoran man who at the age of 17 was blamed for 17 murders, who was in and out of prison and was eventually sentenced by his fellow gang members – serves as a canvas for an even bigger picture: the serious social problem posed by violent gangs in Central America, particularly in El Salvador.

Roberto Valencia, a Spanish journalist who has lived in that Central American country for almost twenty years, has dedicated time and effort to addressing this problem in depth as a reporter for "El Faro". portal Salvadoran news outlet awarded for his research. Letter from Zacatraz (as the local media call the maximum security prison of Zacateoluca) is a journalistic story that through a concrete story exposes the broader panorama of a truly complex reality.

September 11, 2012 was the first time Valencia sat down to talk with Gustavo Adolfo Parada Morales, alias El Directo, someone who for years had garnered media attention, despite the existence of thousands of other young people involved in gangs. That contact staff encouraged the journalist to seek out other testimonies, including fill in a book that collects Parada's direct voice and that of people who knew him, based on interviews with those who loved him, such as his mother or his wife, and with those who confronted him, such as some judges.

As a result of an unwanted pregnancy, El Directo was born on January 25, 1982 in the city of San Miguel. Barely two decades later, he was already the most dangerous and feared man in El Salvador, or at least that's how the media projected him. A member of the Pana di Locos, a clique of the Mara Salvatrucha, he became the main public enemy. From the age of 17, accused of as many murders (of which he only admitted six) and various crimes, El Directo was in three juvenile detention centers and nine prisons. He had the opportunity to start a new life in Costa Rica, but it was ruined. He didn't make it to the United States. He was free for several months, but it wasn't long before the police recaptured him.

Through Parada's life, the author projects the phenomenon of the maras in El Salvador. It emphasizes how this phenomenon mainly affects the lower classes, while the rest of society does not realize the full magnitude of the problem and, therefore, is not interested in finding a solution. How is it possible, Valencia asks, that a society like El Salvador's, with 6.5 million inhabitants, tolerates an average of 10 homicides a day, not to mention the numerous other crimes, in a country where 1% of the population are gang members.

The repressive measures applied by the governments of the right (ARENA) and the left (FMLN) have not improved the gang problem. They have been growing, both inside and outside detention centres, many of which are in a deplorable state. It is precisely the condition of the prisons that aggravates the status: The infrastructure is damaged, there is a great deal of unsanitary conditions and overcrowding is extreme. In most prisons, gang leaders have a large share of control and dominate their respective organizations. "El Salvador's prison system is the most overcrowded in the hemisphere, according to the Organization of American States," Valencia said.

El Directo went through several prisons, where he was seriously wounded on multiple occasions, sometimes by order of the Mara Salvatrucha, which declared him a traitor and threatened to kill him, and other times by police and prison employees. After a few months in prison, he decided to reform himself and give up his activity in the MS. This brought him several opportunities, but he returned to prison. He was finally murdered in 2013, at the age of 31, by members of his new gang, La Mirada Locos, because he had been accused of ordering the killing of someone from the organization with whose wife he had had an affair.

It is interesting to note how in a country where a large number of crimes are recorded, for at least ten years the case of El Directo had an absolute priority in the media, which often exaggerated Parada's criminal record. "We live in a country where great murderers have been granted amnesty. The drugs circulate relatively freely and, despite the fact that police officials have said that there are important names in the business, of the state apparatus and the army involved in drug trafficking, we have not seen any arrests at that level," he told Valencia President of the Central American University, José María Tojeira. And he adds: "Income tax evasion is a fairly widespread vice among the wealthiest sectors. The police are still dealing with a Degree of significant corruption. Deputies are pardoned or investigated for acts in which the life or honor of other citizens has been severely threatened." For his part, Fernando Sáenz Lacalle, archbishop emeritus of San Salvador, regrets that journalists, commentators, analysts and politicians repeated over and over again, "like a church choir, the false refrain of the 17 years, 17 murders." In his opinion, "perhaps they went too far in terms of display and arrogance," according to Valencia.

Roberto Valencia concludes that the problem with the media is that at first they were benevolent towards the gangs, and then magnified the phenomenon, not to mention the repressive measures and the policies used to combat them.

Letter from Zacatraz is not a condescending book, but the criticism does not drown all hope. He warns that Salvadorans have become accustomed to living with this problem. Nowadays it is more common to avoid certain places that are known to be dangerous, than to try to fight for the betterment of the country. But it fosters confidence that shattered lives like El Directo's will serve to make new generations want something better for themselves.