At least 13 people died of suffocation Saturday night in a stampede unleashed in a nightclub in Peru when the police broke in to prevent a party banned by the coronavirus epidemic.
“After a police operation in a discotheque in Los Olivos, 13 people were reported dead,” Peruvian police chief General Orlando Velasco told RPP radio.
The police raided the nightclub where 120 people participated in a party called through social networks, violating the rule that prohibits group meetings in Peru due to the state of health emergency due to the coronavirus.
“Faced with the police intervention, which did not use any type of weapon or tear gas, those attending the party tried to escape through the only entrance door, running over themselves and being trapped between the door and a local staircase,” said the ministry of the Interior in a statement.
The action was triggered an hour before the start of the night curfew, after neighbors complain about a party.
Some party participants and neighbors refuted the police version of having dispensed with tear gas.
“It seems that the police have entered and have thrown tear gas canisters at them and have locked them up, and it seems that these people have died of suffocation,” said a neighbor in the area on RPP radio.
Among the thirteen people who died there are twelve women and one man, informed the Minister for Women, Rosario Sasieta, who arrived at the scene of the tragedy and visited the wounded in a clinic.
Among the injured are three civilians and three policemen, who tried to free and help the trapped people. 23 people were also detained.
According to various testimonies, Panic broke out among the men once a group of agents entered the nightclub and asked the women to leave the premises first.
A good group of attendees managed to get out into the street, but another was trapped when the men ran towards a narrow staircase that was the only way out and ran into the closed door.
Desperation to avoid arrest would have been the spark of the tragedy. Peruvian law provides jail sentences and financial penalties equivalent to $ 110 for those who fail to comply with the provisions due to the pandemic, such as participating in social gatherings.
The party took place at the “Thomas Restobar” nightclub, a two-story light blue house that had been licensed since 2016, according to the municipality of Los Olivos, a populous district north of Lima.
“He died in my arms”
The ages of the victims range between 20 and 30 years, according to press reports.
“If I’m still alive, God knows why, my companion who was with me, died in my arms ”, a devastated young woman who attended the disco where a birthday was celebrated told reporters.
When “The police intervened, the women said get off (…) I carried my girlfriend, but she died on the way to the hospital”, Franco Carrasco told RPP radio.
“It should never have happened, we are in a pandemic, in a health emergency. I ask the maximum sanction to the owners of the discotheque, they are practically responsible, “said the Minister of Women on RPP radio.
Relatives of the victims crowded the Lima morgue to identify the bodies.
“They haven’t brought my daughter’s body yet. I found out that my daughter died of suffocation this morning. From now on, don’t have parties, I don’t have money to bury her, ”Gregoria Velásquez, mother of 26-year-old Maryori Salcedo Velásquez, told the América Televisión channel.
15 detainees with coronavirus
The health authorities announced that 15 of the 23 detainees tested positive for covid-19 at the Los Olivos police center.
“There is a very large focus of coronavirus infection (at the party),” said Dr. Claudio Ramírez from the Ministry of Health.
The night curfew applies throughout Peru from 10:00 p.m. on Saturday (9:00 p.m. in Chile) to 4:00 a.m. (5:00 a.m. in Chile) on Monday, including the entire Sunday day.
The government banned social gatherings to curb the spread of the new coronavirus, which has left 27,453 dead and more than 585,000 confirmed cases since the first contagion in March.
With 33 million inhabitants, Peru is the third in Latin America in deaths from the pandemic after Brazil and Mexico, and second in infections behind the South American giant.
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