AT LEAST 43 KILLED IN ECUADOR PRISON RIOT
At least 43 people died in a prison riot in Ecuador on Monday, according to a statement shared on Twitter by the country’s public prosecutor. And that count could continue to climb — the prosecutor said the situation was “developing.” A “significant number of inmates” had escaped, the interior minister said at a news conference.
The majority of those who died were killed with knives and other improvised weapons, Interior Minister Patricio Carrillo said. Early Monday, videos that appeared to show bloodied bodies lying scattered on the prison grounds circulated on social media.
The riot Monday at Bella Vista prison in Santo Domingo, the country’s fourthlargest
city, left at least 13 inmates injured, and at least 112 were captured trying to escape, officials said.
The slayings come amid a spate of gang-related violence in the country. Ecuadoran President Guillermo Lasso declared a state of emergency in thee provinces last month. Last year, prison riots left at least 68 dead in one instance and more than 100 dead in another. In April,
at least 20 people were killed, and some mutilated, during a riot in El Turi prison, near the city of Cuenca.
Carrillo said he had deployed police and armed forces to quell Monday’s riot. Close to 1 p.m. local time, nearly 12 hours after reports of violence emerged, Ecuador’s police said on Twitter that they had regained control of the prison.