translated from Spanish: Riot in Venezuela: 29 prisoners killed and 19 police wounded in riot at police detention center in Acariagua

At least 29 detainees were killed and 19 police officers injured Two after a riot and attempted escape in a police detention centre in the town of Acarigua, in western Venezuela, Venezuelan authorities said.
“There was an attempt to escape and there was also a quarrel between sides” opponents of the detainees, said Óscar Valero, secretary of Public Security of the state of Portuguesa, where is Acarigua.
With “police intervention to prevent the escape, there were 29 deceased” among the 355 prisoners of the José Antonio Páez police complex.
The riot began at midnight this Saturday and the detainees were trying to escape through a hole in one of the walls, according to Valero, who added that the prisoners detonated three hand grenades.
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The director of the NGO a window to freedom, Carlos Nieto, said that the clash occurred when the special body of the police FAES tried to rescue visitors who had been taken hostage on Thursday by Pran, the leader of the prisoners.
Police dungeons, transient spaces where the captured must pass no more than 48 hours, have become prisons, Nieto said.
A window of freedom and other non-governmental groups such as the Venezuelan Observatory of Prisons and the Venezuelan program of education-action in human Rights (Providea), denounced that there was a massacre on the part of the officers.
The detainees had at least three days claiming the presence of the Ombudsman and the Public Prosecutor’s Office in order not to be transferred to distant prisons, said Humberto Prado, director of the Observatory.
According to Prado, the inmates asked to stay in nearby areas to be visited by their relatives.
Neither the Ministry of Information nor the Public Prosecutor’s Office have spoken so far about the incident.
Videos circulating on social networks show the alleged ringleader of the rioting prisoners warning that “he is willing to die” in case of a possible intervention of the security forces.
The detainee also notes: “We are taking over the visits”, referring to the relatives of the prisoners who were at that time in the police complex.
According to the version released by the local media The whistle, the mutiny had started 10 days ago in this detention centre in which the prisoners are crammed.
According to this version, the situation escalated from Thursday, when troops from different police forces surrounded the center.
Venezuela has suffered a problem of overcrowding in prisons and police cells for years.
In March 2018 a riot in a prison in Valencia left 68 dead.

Original source in Spanish

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