Dozens of prisoners killed in recent clashes in Ecuador’s prisons Prison News

Police say 58 prisoners were killed and 12 injured in another violence at the Guayaquil Penitentiary.

Dozens of prisoners have been killed in heavy clashes in a prison in Ecuador’s largest city, Guayaquil, according to authorities.

“According to initial reports, about 68 prisoners were killed and another 25 injured,” the Ecuadorian prosecutor’s office wrote on Twitter on Saturday, killing 58 people and injuring 12, raising the balance previously given by police.

Penitenciaria del Litoral, on the outskirts of Guayaquil in the province of Guayas, was one of such incidents in prison in recent months. In September, a clash between rival groups He killed 119 prisoners.

Nearly 300 inmates have been killed this year in Ecuador’s broken prison system, where thousands of inmates linked to drug groups become violent clashes.

Residents living near the jail on Saturday heard hours of gunfire and explosions coming from inside the jail. Outside, relatives of the prisoners gathered to inform them of their relatives.

“That’s enough. When will they stop the murder? This is a prison, not a slaughterhouse, they are human beings, ”said Francisca Chancay, 55, whose brother has been in prison for eight months.

Some demanded that Ecuadorian security forces take control of the prisons.

“What is [President Guillermo] Waiting for Lasso? Are there more dead? ″, Said Maritza Vera, whose 62-year-old son is in prison. ”Mercy, where are the human rights. We thought this would change, but it’s worse. ‘

Prison violence has occurred amid a national state of emergency decreed by Lasso in October that gives security forces the power to deal with drug trafficking and other crimes.

Ecuador has 40,000 prisoners in the prison system, of whom about 8,500 are on the Coast. According to prison services, there are 55% overcrowded facilities at the national level and 62% at the Coastal facilities.

It was reported last month by the head of the country’s prison authority They would pardon 2,000 prisoners trying to reduce the overcrowding in his detention centers.

Bolivar Garzon, director of the SNAI prison authority, said on October 1 that the government would prioritize the release of elderly prisoners and women, as well as those with disabilities and terminal illnesses.