A brawl inside the sentencing area at the Puente Grande Penitentiary Center in Jalisco left seven dead and nine injured, state officials reported.
Jalisco’s prosecutor, Gerardo Octavio Solís, said three people would have died by firearm, while four others were killed by the same inmates of the criminal.
Read more: Chalco’s criminal feud
Injured people have already been taken to different hospitals in the state.
At a press conference, Jalisco authorities said they had secured two firearms, as well as a possible homemade explosive device.
Meanwhile, the director general of Reinserción Social, José Antonio Pérez Juárez, said that until now, it is known that there was an assault of a group of five people deprived of the freedom against colleagues, which caused discomfort in the criminal population and provoked the scuffle, about 13:30 hours this Friday, May 22.
The official explained that there were between six and seven gun detonations, and although he ruled out the fact that the events were for a possible mutiny, there is still no theory of the motivation of the alleged assailants, who are detained in the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
“There was no dispute over control of the center, but a very small group assaulted colleagues and the angry population responded, because the people attacked were not people causing trouble,” he insisted.
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The Jalisco State Human Rights Commission (ECHRJ) said it was in communication with prison authorities and initiated the 190/2020/IV fact-of-investigation act.
It is essential that the health status of the people involved is clearly informed, attended to and disclosed, as well as safeguarding the integrity of inmates and staff.
— ECHR in Jalisco (@CEDHJ) May 22, 2020
Saturation in Puente Grande
The Prison system in Jalisco is the second with the highest number of inmates in overcrowded conditions in the country.
According to official data, at the start of this year its 12 local prisons housed a total of 13 thousand 278 inmates, however, the number of available spaces was only 10 thousand 102, i.e. 31% above installed capacity.
This means that more than 3,000 inmates are in overpopulation in Jalisco, the second highest figure nationally, behind only the State of Mexico that reports an overpopulation of 15 thousand 500 inmates.
In addition, at the Di sentencing station of the Puente Grande State Penal, where the confrontation was, the problem is much more serious.
According to official figures, this complex is only enabled to house 2,87 inmates, however, its population is 4,147 inmates, which equates to an overpopulation level of 98.7%, there are almost twice as many inmates above those it should be.
This problem is greatly exacerbated because there are 817 inmates of the federal jurisdiction in that prison who should not be there, as local criminals have neither space nor adequate security measures to accommodate inmates of this type.
With information from Arturo Angel (@arturoangel20)
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