Government raid on jail kills 37 in Venezuela

Thirty-seven inmates were killed during a raid by government security forces on a prison in Venezuela’s southern jungle state of Amazonas, the governor said yesterday.

Violent gangs are said to control many prisons and the government occasionally sends in forces, often with deadly results. “There was a massacre,” tweeted Liborio Guarulla, the Amazonas governor, who said 37 prisoners had died.

“The morgue is totally overwhelmed,” he said later in an interview.