In an effort to alleviate some of the overcrowding in Colombia’s prisons, Inpec announced it ordered the transfer of 2,938 inmates from 142 facilities over the past six months. This week Justice Minister, Ruth Correa, began touring the country’s main facilities to assess overcrowding which, in some cases, is as much as 200 percent, causes health problems and makes coexistence between inmates more difficult. Correa said the biggest problems are in La Modelo and La Picota, in Bogotá; Vistahermosa, in Cali; and Bellavista, in Bello.

Transfers have been made to facilities in Jamundí, Valle; La Colonia and the Acacías Penitentiary in Meta; Tierralta in Córdoba, among others that report vacancies. The possibility of asking municipal jails to take in some interns, pending mayoral approval, is also under consideration.

Overcrowding in La Cuarenta, in Pereira, is at 144 percent, because its capacity is for 676 inmates and 1,630 are currently housed there. In Vistahermosa it’s 200 percent, there are 5,040 inmates in a prison with capacity for just 1547.

Thirty beauty salons did not pass inspection by Medellín’s Public Health Department and while the red stickers that identify them aren’t necessarily permanent, they do mean that significant changes must be made before conditions are deemed safe for customers.

For this year, the Health Department has 5,400 inspections plans; 933 salons have already been inspected, of which 202 met all requirements, and 701 had violations that must be corrected but are not a health hazard to customers.

Not being in London right now would not only be a huge mistake, but might also give the Olympic Committee the impression that Medellín lacks interest in hosting the Youth Olympic Games.

With this in mind, the Mayor of Medellín, Aníbal Gaviria, along with members of his cabinet and departmental authorities, is traveling to London today to help promote the city’s bid to host the event in 2018. “We feel we need to have a visible presence at these Olympic games because other cities vying for the event will be doing just that (…)”

Medellín is up against Buenos Aires, Glasgow, Poznan and Rotterdam.

The arrest of former mayor of Magangué, Jorge Luis Alfonso (alias el Gatico) is, according to the director of the National Police, General Jose Roberto Leon, one of the biggest accomplishments from the “olympic marathon for security” carried out this week by 16,000 officers in 24 cities.

The ranch serving as a hideout for Alfonso had many similarities to the Nápoles Hacienda that belonged to fallen drug lord, Pablo Escobar

According to authorities, Alfonso also had a number of weapons including a sniper rifle, an American pistol and an Israeli one.

Over the weekend 3,394 people were arrested, 73 cars and 133 motorcycles which had been reported as stolen were recovered and 2,800 cell phones were confiscated.