Pretending to be COVID-19 victim, mayor lies in casket to avoid arrest  

In an effort to avoid detention, the mayor of a small town in Peru jumped into an open casket and pretended to be a COVID-19 victim when police raided at the house.

According to the details, the mayor Jaime Rolando Urbina Torres tried to play dead after being caught by police violating coronavirus lockdown rules while drinking with his friends in Tantara, a town in the south of the country.

Police say he violated curfew and social distancing laws in order to drink liquor with his friends, and was drunk when he was arrested

Torres has previously been accused by locals of failing to take the threat of the virus seriously and failing to implement safety precautions in the town, Mail Online reported.

The town, along with the rest of Peru, was officially placed into lockdown 66 days ago by the central government.

But angry locals say Torres has spent just eight days in the town since the start of the lockdown, and has failed to put in place any local safety measures.

The absentee mayor was hauled to a town meeting on May 9 to defend himself, when he unleashed a series of angry tirades against locals.

He was also accused of failing to put in proper safety checks to ensure people from outside the town cannot enter it.

The Americas is now at the epicentre of the global coronavirus pandemic, with the region seeing coronavirus case totals and deaths rise faster than any other region.

The region currently has 2.1million cases of coronavirus, a higher total than previous epicentre Europe which has 1.9million.