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At least 15 people were killed and 20 others were hurt in a fight involving prisoners who were armed with knives and weapons on Monday inside the Latacunga prison in central Ecuador, according to police. Officials blamed the violence on local and international drug trafficking organisations that have repeatedly killed inmates in the Andean nation’s prisons in their struggle for dominance and control over the drug trade. The Latacunga jail, which is 80 kilometres (50 miles) south of Quito, was certified to have a death toll by Ecuador’s national penal service.
The pavilions of the prison are still being searched by agents for bodies. On social media, videos were shared in which prisoners’ screams and gunfire could be heard. The penitentiary administration reports that around 316 prisoners died within Ecuador’s jails last year. 90 people have passed away thus far this year. At the Litoral Penitentiary in Guayaquil, 125 inmates perished in the deadliest slaughter, which occurred in September of last year. As of last month, 35,000 inmates were being housed in 53 state prisons, despite the fact that Ecuador’s jail system is only intended to hold roughly 30,000 individuals.
