SAN JOSE — Costa Rica opened a prison for 5,100 people on Wednesday, and by the next day a prisoners’ rights association had asked the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court to stop anyone from being moved into it.
President Laura Fernández inaugurated the High-Containment Centre Against Organised Crime, known as CACCO, beside the La Reforma prison in San Rafael de Alajuela, according to Anadolu Agency. She said the day marked “a before and after in prison security and national security as a whole” and that Costa Rica would become “a global benchmark for prison security.” The design came from El Salvador, where Nayib Bukele has just floated a plan to release detainees held under his state of emergency while keeping the emergency itself.
The challenge came fast. The Asociación Ayudando a los Privados de Libertad y sus Familias filed an amparo appeal with the Sala Constitucional the day after the opening, Euronews reported, citing La Nación. It argues that conditions could violate prisoners’ rights to health, privacy and safety, questions cell conditions and staffing, and seeks a precautionary halt to transfers due to start at the end of the month.
The presidency streamed the ceremony live on its official YouTube channel.
The centre can hold about a fifth of the national prison population. Euronews reported a construction cost of 15,800 million colones, about 31.1 million euros. The prison system sits under the Justice Ministry, which the presidency’s cabinet page says is led by Gabriel Aguilar Vargas.
The government’s case rests on violence. Costa Rica recorded a record 905 homicides in 2023, Euronews said, citing judicial data, and it has become a growing transit point for cocaine bound for Europe, which has drawn Mexican and Colombian cartels. Fernández took office in May after campaigning on toughness toward drug networks. Several judges, Euronews added, have warned of new pressures on democratic checks and balances.
Critics look to the model’s source. In a 2025 report, Human Rights Watch documented repeated beatings, torture and sexual violence involving 252 Venezuelans deported to El Salvador by the administration of US President Donald Trump, Anadolu noted.
The model is spreading. Ecuador and Honduras have announced plans for similar prisons, Euronews said, and Peru’s Keiko Fujimori, who took office in July on a mega-prison pledge, is considering one.
Fernández is due in El Salvador on Friday. Neither Euronews nor Anadolu says how many prisoners will be moved first or on what criteria, and Euronews’s Thursday report gives no date for a ruling on the appeal.
