Punta de Rieles, the Uruguayan prison model that feels like a small town. Without bars.

Fifteen kilometers from Montevideo, there's a prison where prisoners are free to work, study, and move around the prison grounds. Many of them start businesses, others graduate. Playing PlayStation and listening to cumbia

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Uruguay model prison

A model prison, an "open" prison, where inmates can truly realize they have another chance to avoid wasting their lives. We're not in a Northern European country, or some American state highly advanced in judicial policies: we're in Montevideo, Uruguay, a corner of South America where prisons are often veritable living hells.

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URUGUAY MODEL PRISON

We're in the Punta de Rieles detention center, and Luis Parodi, the director, has an ambitious goal in mind: to make the facility as similar as possible to the outside world, a city within a city, where dogs, pigs, and chickens raised by the inmates roam free. The only thing that reminds the prisoners that they're serving a prison sentence is the presence of four watchtowers and the barbed wire surrounding them, a legacy of the women's detention center that operated during the Uruguayan dictatorship.

And then, the guards: civilians, unarmed, about a hundred of them, mostly women. All have little prison experience, like Lourdes, 35, with a degree in psychology. The relationships of the 500 inmates, all men, with the guards are very respectful, and if someone overdoes it, they're quickly put back in their place by the others. They have a special, benevolent relationship with the guards, feeling reassured and protected, as many of them assure us in a report in the newspaper Perfil: "The relationship is very different from the one we have with the police; they don't treat us like animals," they say. And besides, at Punta de Rieles, the police intervene only in rare emergency situations.

The administration's goal is to create a positive daily routine and a peaceful environment for the inmates: Prisoners come and go freely through the alleys, from their cells to the courtyard, from the library to the cafeteria, with no other restrictions than the large perimeter fence. In the cell blocks, the music blares, making it feel more like a boarding school for troubled teenagers than a prison. The doors remain open day and night, PlayStations are played, and inmates maintain contact with their families through the free use of cell phones. Little by little, the prisoners, who laugh and play in this model prison, come to terms with the excessive violence and humiliating treatment they received during their experiences, both in other prisons and beyond.

Uruguay model prison

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PUNTA DE RIELES MONTEVIDEO

Many of them, in fact, have a history of property crimes, robberies, gang-related crimes, or crimes associated with a world that relies heavily on violence: like Julio, who has been in prison for over ten years for cocaine dealing and armed robbery. When he arrived at Punta de Rieles, he didn't even know how to use a computer. Today, however, he runs a cement block factory within the prison grounds. He has numerous clients and orders, and has even learned to keep his books using a computer.

Or like Rey, 34, convicted of petty crimes of vandalism and property crimes, who enrolled at the university. Every morning he hops on his bicycle, passes the prison gates, and rides the twenty kilometers to the University of Montevideo, where he studies engineering. However, he often has to skip lunch because the prison administration can't afford it, and the same happens with books and teaching materials. Punta de Rieles, in fact, as the director admits, doesn't have much funding; it relies mostly on a minimal budget and contributions from inmate activities. 

The formula proposed by Punta de Rieles seems to work: traditional prison codes are broken, and people greet each other, touch each other, hug each other. 

Getting in, however, comes at a price: a prerequisite is a commitment to work or study. In addition to their salary, inmates serve one day of detention for every two days they work or study.

This Uruguayan prison is truly a model, where the meaning of punishment, rehabilitation to civic and social life, is fully respected. At Punta de Rieles, the violence subsides, smiles return, as does faith in the future and in a life without bars, a second chance that inmates will be able to face with renewed vigor.

(Prominent image accompanying the text taken from the newspaper Profile // Photo credits Perfil-CEDOC)

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