At least 16 inmates are dead as a result of riots in the Maracaibo prison in the state of Zulia, in Venezuela. Last Sept. 16, groups of inmates disputed over control of some of the prison's areas.
According to information published by Mexican newspaper La Jornada, the Venezuelan Prison Observatory (OVP) informed on Tuesday, Sept. 17, that the clashes inside the Maracaibo prison took the lives of several inmates.
For their part, the Prosecutor of Prison Matters of Venezuela has been fast to deny these declarations and assured they would investigate the clashes.
"I know the motives, which are futile motives, not honorable... It was not at all to take control of a prison area," assured Iris Varela, the Minister of Prison Matters, in an interview with news agency AFP.
The official estimated that among the deceased there were inmates with "a negative leadership in some areas."
"15 people died there, there's another one, number 16, that also died but elsewhere," declared Ms. Varela, quoted by the news agency.
"There are allegedly dismembered inmates, decapitated and their arms and legs torn from their bodies," Humberto Prado, director of the NGO Venezuelan Prison Observatory, told AFP.
"It's amazing and scary, I shudder from observing that... they pretend that nothing happened. They come out saying that nothing happened here," he stated.
According to newspaper La Tercera, one of the non-official versions of what happened in the prison is the strong rumor that one of the prison leaders tried to take control of three communal areas in the National Maracaibo prison (also known as the "jail of Sabaneta"), which started the riots.
According to OVP, between January and June of this year, violent clashes among inmates have left at least 32 people dead.
Venezuelan prisons registered, on numerous occasions, violent incidents which took the lives of inmates. In 2012 alone, 600 deaths were reported in the same prison, which has a capacity for 750 inmates but currently houses over 3,700.
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