The Center for Investigative Journalism (CPI) located in Puerto Rico, breaks the news that armed and masked men with no ID’s are now patrolling the streets of San Juan. Members of the United States Air Force that were consulted by the CPI said that “both the shotgun and the machine gun carried by the men of Ciudadela are automatic or semi-automatic weapons, after seeing a photo”.
It’s the morning of Oct. 7 and a man stops traffic on Antonsanti Street in Santurce, behind the Ciudadela building. He is wearing a helmet, sunglasses, face mask, a vest with ammunition, gloves, plastic straps used for arrests, boots, camouflaged pants with knee pads, a knife and gun. There is a machine gun in his hand. He has no plaque or ID.
He works for a private security firm hired by Nicholas Prouty, the owner of the Ciudadela complex. Prouty turned to that service after Hurricane María, he told the Center for Investigative Journalism (CPI in Spanish) last week.
“With a substantial reduction in the number of police officers on the streets (due to the government’s reallocation of resources to protect diesel and supply chains), and most streets lights not functioning, Ciudadela has taken the necessary steps to make its residents and commercial tenants feel safe,” he said, without revealing the name of the security firm.
Who do you work for?, the CPI asked the armed man who was at Ciudadela.
“We work with the government,” he answered.
Which division?
“It’s a humanitarian mission, we’re helping Puerto Rico,” he said in broken Spanish.
And why the covered face?
“Because if I go with my daughter to eat at Burger King tomorrow and somebody identifies me, they could kill me,” he said.
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Security firm Academi, known by its former name, Blackwater for getting a $21 million contract with the U.S. government to provide security services during the Iraq war in 2003, said that they already have offers from the local and federal government and by the Red Cross to come to Puerto Rico.
“We’re ready to go,” said Paul Donahue, Chief Operating Officer of Constellis, Academi’s parent company, in a phone interview with the CPI. He explained that if the government of Puerto Rico accepts the proposal made by Academi to respond to the government’s offer, they would be providing security services for water transportation. The company already operates in the Caribbean islands of Dominica and St. Martin, where they arrived after Hurricanes Irma and Maria made landfall. This company, described as an army of mercenaries by investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill, has changed its name three times since its founding in 1997 by a former Navy Seal Officer (United States Marine, Air and Land Teams.)
Blackwater also operated in New Orleans after the passing of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. There they worked under a federal contract and for millionaires who left the city before the storm passed. They were hired to protect their properties.
On the entry of U.S. security companies into Puerto Rico, Mercado, Ranger America’s vice president of operations, said, “We have signed service contracts with U.S. security firms that have hired us to in turn provide security to clients they have here in Puerto Rico… I would say there are large numbers (of companies), but we have seen hiring (of U.S. security companies) in the area of communications and in the hotel area. They are companies that we don’t really know about, they have no presence here in Puerto Rico, but they have come and we know they are serving some corporations and multinationals.”
The Daily Beast reported on looting in the capital and gangs with bats roaming the streets of San Juan. Similar to the lack of truckers of which many are trapped and victims of Hurricane Maria, it makes sense that local police officers also share that predicament. We know conditions on the island are rapidly deteriorating. Cash is only accepted on the island as ATM’s are not powered. People are in survival mode and security is critical. But the idea of Eric Prince getting contracts in Puerto Rico is unsettling none the less.
Incidents like these are common in the capital, where men carrying bats and clubs have been seen on the streets during curfew hours. The mayor of San Juan, Carmen Yulin Cruz, told WAPA Radio, “We highly advise everyone not to be on the streets at night. It is not safe,” warning that reports of looting are on the rise.
“That is definitely something I don’t want to hear. Especially when the only lighting I have during the night is candlelight,” said Bianca Nevarez, who lives in Bayamon, where the scenario is much more tense since 13 prisoners escaped while they were being transferred to another criminal facility after the Category 5 storm caused severe damage in the prison. “We have captured eight of them, so five are still on the loose,” Ramon Rosario, secretary of Public Affairs of La Fortaleza told The Daily Beast.
Rosario added that 21 arrests have been made across the metropolitan area as a result of those breaking the curfew, which now runs from 7 p.m. to 5 a.m. No expiration date has been set.
“We will leave it active until the emergency period that we are suffering settles,” said Governor Ricardo Rosselló, noting that anyone caught on the streets during curfew hours will face up to six months in prison.