While growing up, he was in and out of reform schools and never held a job for more than a couple of weeks. Since his release three years ago, he has married, bought a home, and he works 10 hours a day in a bakery. Santucho attributes his success on the outside to his life-changing experience inside the prison. More evangelicals mean fewer problems for us. Olmos warden Juan Carlos Bagnasco wishes all inmates behaved as well as those in the evangelical cellblocks.
Official recognition translates into special privileges for the inmates.
Members of the church are the only ones allowed to staff the prison hospital. Tejeda says plans to expand the space devoted to Christians in the prison are opposed, not by penitentiary authorities, but by inmates. None of the Christian inmates participated in a weeklong riot in April that resulted in several injuries. When he heard of the uprising, head inmate pastor Ramon Avalos took immediate action. By Ralph D. Tone in La Plata, Argentina.