Ecuador: Ringleaders and weapons used in massacre that left 20 dead in Cuenca prison identified

The authorities Ecuadorian announced this Monday that at least five weapons were used in the murder of twenty prisoners that occurred on Sunday in the prison of the southern Andean city of Basinwhere five inmates have also been identified as leaders of the massacre.

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While the investigations continue, the country’s president himself, Guillermo Lasso, assured that actions have been taken to restore tranquility to the penitentiary center, also known as Turi, as well as among the population, which was once again shocked by this type of event.

“Security is priority number 1 of our Government. When it is at stake we act firmly and immediately. That is why the Minister of the Interior, Patricio Carrillo, has already begun the process of transferring five leaders of criminal gangs from Turi to La Roca”, in Guayaquil, Lasso wrote on his Twitter account.

Carrillo reported at a press conference in Cuenca that “ballistic evidence” or shell casings from five different weapons used in the “irrational acts of Sunday” have been found in the Turi prison.

It is, he explained, weapons of various calibers, such as 9 millimeters, .38, .40, .45 and 223, the latter used in long weapons or rifles.

The Ecuadorian Police has highlighted the importance of identifying the weapons because this would allow them to check if they have been used in other crimes in the country, in South America or in other nations of the world.

SURRENDERED BODIES

The minister indicated that 17 of the 20 bodies of prisoners killed in Sunday’s riots have already been fully identified and that 10 of them have already been handed over to their respective families.

Likewise, Carrillo indicated that the authorities have discovered how the weapons were “warmed up” or hidden in the infrastructure of the prison center, so that they would not be discovered by the prison guards.

“We have a huge battle against this violence” in prisons, but also “against corruption” that affects the administration of prisons, he said.

The head of the Interior portfolio accepted that the operation of the authorities to restore tranquility to the Turi prison could generate reactions in other penitentiary centers, where gangs identified as “Los Lobos” and their dissident group, self-styled “R- 7″.

The Government, he said, will act decisively to guarantee security in prisons. “It cannot be that we are subject to them, instead of the State subjecting them,” said the minister.

On his side, Pablo Ramírez, director of the National Service for Comprehensive Attention to Persons Deprived of Liberty (SNAI), mentioned that the relocation of certain inmates is due to alerts due to their background and behavior, which can generate threats or put at risk security in prisons.

TRANSFER OF LEADERS

Under these circumstances, five inmates considered to be leaders of violent groups from the Turi prison were transferred to the maximum security prison in the Ecuadorian city of Guayaquil, known as “La Roca”.

According to the Ecuadorian authorities, nineteen of the twenty prisoners who died in Sunday’s events died of violent acts and one “due to the ingestion of a drink, some chemical product that caused his death.”

This was the first major violent event this year in the Ecuadorian prison system, which was declared an emergency last year after 316 prisoners died in all of 2021 in a series of massacres between rival gangs vying for internal control of the prisons. jails.

According to a report by Amnesty International (AI) in February of last year, 79 inmates were murdered in prisons, 119 in September and 62 in November, massacres attributed by the Government to the dispute between drug gangs, which would be related to drug cartels. drug from Colombia and Mexico.

Source: Elcomercio

Deshawn