Mexican army soldiers and National Guard members stand guard outside the Tabasco State Social Rehabilitation Center (Creset) after a riot broke out inside the prison in Villahermosa, Tabasco State, Mexico, on December 19, 2024. (Photo by Maria CRUZ / AFP)
Mexico City: Seven prisoners were killed and six others injured in a prison riot in southern Mexico.
The Mexican authorities said in a statement Friday that the prisoners died when some of them resisted the transfer of two of their colleagues to other prisons yesterday, which led to a confrontation with police officers in which guns and knives were used by the inmates of the prison located in Villahermosa, the capital of Tabasco state, noting that four police officers were injured.
Victor Hugo Chavez, the state police chief, said in statements that the officers were shot early yesterday, Thursday, when they entered the prison to transfer two dangerous prisoners to a federal prison, adding that one of the prisoners, who was armed with a gun, resisted for three hours after about 20 of his fellow prisoners protected him.
Chavez did not specify whether police opened fire on the group of prisoners, but noted that after the situation stabilized in the facility, authorities found an assault rifle, five pistols, a hand grenade, 23 machetes, 14 knives and 23 homemade sharp weapons.
Mexican police are occasionally forced to intervene to deal with prison disturbances, where clashes occur between police and prisoners or between the gangs themselves, often resulting in deaths and injuries.
