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QUITO, Ecuador (AP) – The Ecuadorian president has declared a state of emergency in the prison system following a battle between gang members in a coastal dungeon that killed at least 118 people and injured 79 in what authorities say is the worst prison bloodbath ever in the country.
Authorities said at least five of the dead were beheaded.
Dozens of police and army vehicles, as well as ambulances, entered the prison grounds on Thursday. Helicopters flew over the area.
There could be more bodies or seriously injured people in the prison, said Colonel Tannya Varela, commander of the national police.
Hundreds of people gathered outside the crime lab in Guayaquil, hoping to recover the bodies of relatives they believed were killed in the prison. The prosecutor’s office said on Twitter that police were making efforts to identify the bodies.
Henry Coral, a police officer, has asked family members to help speed up the identification of the bodies by notifying authorities of any tattoos, scars or other distinguishing features of prisoners believed to have been killed. Some bodies were mutilated or burned, making identification more difficult.
President Guillermo Lasso on Wednesday declared a state of emergency, which will give the government powers such as the deployment of police and soldiers inside prisons. The order came a day after bloodshed at Litoral Penitentiary in Guayaquil which officials blamed on gangs linked to international drug cartels fighting for control of the facility.
“It is unfortunate that prisons are being turned into land of power struggles by criminal gangs,” said Lasso, adding that he would act with “absolute firmness” to regain control of Litoral prison and prevent violence from occurring. spread to other penitentiaries.
Images circulating on social media showed dozens of bodies in prison pavilions 9 and 10 and scenes that resembled battlefields. The fighting took place with guns, knives and bombs, officials said. Earlier, the regional police commander Fausto Buenaño had said that bodies had been found in the pipes of the prison.
Outside the prison morgue, relatives of inmates cried, with some describing to reporters the cruelty with which their loved ones were beheaded and dismembered.
“In the history of the country, there has not been an incident similar or close to this one,” said Ledy Zúñiga, the former president of the National Rehabilitation Council of Ecuador.
Zúñiga, who was also the country’s justice minister in 2016, said she regretted that steps were not taken to prevent another massacre following the deadly prison riots last February.
Earlier, officials said violence erupted following a dispute between gangs at “Los Lobos” and “Los Choneros” prison.
Colonel Mario Pazmiño, former director of Ecuadorian military intelligence, said the bloody fighting shows that “transnational organized crime has penetrated the structure” of Ecuadorian prisons, adding that the Mexican cartels of Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation operate through local gangs.
“They want to spread fear,” he told The Associated Press on Wednesday, urging the government to temporarily hand over control of the prisons to the national police. “The more radical and violent the way they murder,” the more they achieve their goal of control, he added.
Luis Hernández, a political and military affairs analyst who was a general in the Ecuadorian army, said imprisoned gang members were extending their control from prisons to the streets, handling debts, deliveries and other aspects of the illegal trade in Drugs.
Ecuador is a key transit point for drug trafficking organizations due to its good road infrastructure, three international seaports and two international airports, Hernández said.
The Ecuadorian president said that care points had been set up for relatives of detainees with food and psychological support. He added that a program to deal with the country’s prisons will be accelerated, starting with investments in infrastructure and technology in Litoral prison.
Former director of Ecuador’s prison office, Fausto Cobo, said that inside penitentiaries the authorities face a “threat with power equal to or greater than that of the state itself” . He said that while security forces are to enter prisons with shields and unarmed, they are greeted by inmates with large caliber weapons.
In July, the president declared another state of emergency in the Ecuadorian prison system following several violent episodes that resulted in the deaths of more than 100 inmates. These deaths have occurred in various prisons and not in a single facility like Tuesday’s massacre.
Previously, the bloodiest day had been in February, when 79 prisoners died in simultaneous riots in three prisons across the country. In July, 22 other prisoners lost their lives in Litoral Penitentiary, while in September a prison center was attacked by drones, leaving no one dead.
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