The number of crimes committed with firearms in Cuba grows, according to experts

Firearms are increasingly involved in the occurrence of crimes in Cuba, where the strict control of the State on the weapons, and all types of lethal materials, prohibits its commercialization.

“It is certainly considerable to increase the use of firearms in the crime commission. It does not happen, too much, in the murders, in which the murderers prefer to use white weapons -they are the most common weapons in the Cuban environment -but it does happen, for example, in assaults and robberies, ”said the researcher of the Cuban Observatory of Citizen Audit, José Manuel González Rubines, a master’s degree in democracy and good governance, settled in Madrid.

In the early hours of March 8, in Camagüey, Osmany Trujillo died from a homemade firearm shot, a relative close to the victim who asked not to be identified.

The incident occurred during the assault of a band of criminals to the wholesale company of food products located in the Brazil Popular Council, of the Esmeralda municipality, where Trujillo worked, 58 years old.

According to our source, those involved in the aggression have already been captured.

“I must highlight in this something that seems curious, and that is, very eventually, weapons shoot. In general, they are used only as a deterrent, so we cannot say that it is not even a real firewife; That is, it is a firewife that is used in a deterrent, it is not stopped. You may not have ammunition, it may not be real, it may not work. It is very difficult to affirm it, ”said the specialist.

«What can be said is that there is an increase in crimes in which firearms are involved, often with artisanal invoice, firearms that many times people denounce that they have been stolen from the state system, either by casualties, by robbery or for losses, or that they have entered the country illegally,» he added.

The Cuban Criminal Code punishes with deprivation of liberty up to 10 years the carrying and illegal possession of weapons and explosives.

“It establishes different sanctions depending on the typical action. For example, whoever acquires, carries or has in their possession a firearm, or its pieces or components, without legal authorization, can be sanctioned to deprivation of liberty of two to five years, ”said Giselle Morfi, head of the Legal Team of the Cubalex Legal Advice Center.

“Another of the typical behavior that punishes is to manufacture the weapon, sell it, traffic it or even facilitate it or its pieces or components; The sanction established is three to eight years of deprivation of liberty, ”he added.

The lawyer explained that the penalties are three to eight years of deprivation of liberty for the illegal possession of the weapon and four to 10 if the crime involves the manufacture, sale or traffic of these weapons.

On the other hand, although the person has legal authorization to possess the firearm, if he is carrying it «in a place or at a time that is prohibited by law, it can be sanctioned to deprivation of liberty from six months to two years, or a fine of 200 to 500 installments.»

Likewise, if the legally authorized person provides or facilitates another, incurs a sanction of one to three years in prison or high fines.

Cuba ensures that it has scrupulous inspection mechanisms to guarantee the safety of arsenals, however, many withdrawals from the FAR (Revolutionary Armed Forces) and the Minint (Ministry of Interior) treasure in their homes the weapon they carried during the service. Even some high positions of the Communist Party and the Government have permission to take them.

“I would like to emphasize that in the monitoring of crimes committed throughout the year 2024, in the same way that it was made in 2023. We did not count the times in which crimes were committed in which firearms were involved. It is probably a pending subject, but at this time it is not accounted for, ”said González Rubines in reference to the 2024 Public Insecurity Report, produced by the Cuban Observatory of Citizen Audit with the sponsorship of the Cuba Century Organization 21st.

“Does this mean that there is a market in Cuba? Likely. There is a firearms market, but it is an investigation that is still to be carried out. What is a fact is how firearms circulate in the country, ”said the expert.

Cuba would have one of the lowest rates of possession of firearms by civilians in the world, but without statistics it is difficult to affirm it categorically. There are no public records about the amount and type of weapons that circulate in the country, or the deaths caused by them.

«Crime and what we could already be calling organized crime within Cuba, is making firearms,» ​​said, from Havana, the political analyst, Manuel Cuesta Morúa, vice president of the Council for the Democratic Transition in Cuba (CTDC).

“That is very worrying, because it indicates two things: first, that crime is willing to everything, it is no longer only the crime of survival, but it is lucrative crime; Second, that there seems to be some gap in the inventories of the government itself, because here, definitely, 3D weapons are not made, that is for developed countries, ”said the opponent.

The last inventory of firearms in Cuba that has news occurred in 2010, when the Ministry of Interior of Cuba ordered the registration of all firearms in the hands of the population.

Cuban authorities are not transparent about the control mechanisms of deceased, incapacitated or abandoned the country. Nor of the shotguns that some peasants and hunters possess.

In spite of the unappealable prohibition on the possession of firearms, in recent years they have come to public violent events in which they were used.

At the beginning of December 2024, in the municipality of Colón, Matanzas, an alleged thief who used a firearm in the robbery of a house was arrested.

At the beginning of February 2025, the police arrested a Cuban for having several weapons and ammunition inside his home, located in the Los Pinos neighborhood, Habanero Arroyo Naranjo municipality: “A modern perle shotgun with optical sight, a 22 -caliber shotgun, and more than 150 cartridges of different calibers”.

In addition, there was a cartridge carrier belt with 27 bullets, another with 18 pods, and a good number of shotguns and shotgun pistons.

Also in February of this year, in Marianao, Havana, two criminals provided with a long weapon assaulted a messenger and stole his motorcycle.

The general customs of Cuba has accepted an increase in weapons entry to the country, however, it has not provided exact figures.

Meanwhile, gender observatories have verified, within compiled feminicides, crimes carried out with firearms. The first of this type publicly documented occurred in Guantanamo, when the young Damaris Rodríguez Domínguez was killed by her partner, a traffic policeman, who also shot the paramedic who accompanied her.

Similarly, the murder of Rosmery Ponce, in the town of Güines, Mayabeque, was executed with a firearm. Both femicides, in 2023.

Recently, resolution 9 of 2024 authorized the use of weapons to increase the “security and physical protection of agricultural production, constructive and assembly investments, and other urban and rural areas of interest for defense, which are part of the state -owned state heritage” by the MINFAR.

Cuesta Morúa announced that, due to the danger that the phenomenon represents for Cuban society, they will promptly address their study and dissemination in Shanti, a strategy against all types of violence in Cuba, driven by the CTDC.

“In the bankruptcy of the Cuban social fabric, proliferating violence with firearms already implies another level of danger and disintegration of society that needs to be attended. The authorities have a lot of capacity to suppress peaceful actors; Absolutely none, to suppress violent actors, ”said the historian.