MEXICO CITY: Seven people were reportedly killed on Monday in northern Mexico’s Ciudad Juarez as the local police conducted an operation to recapture prisoners who had escaped after an attack at their facility a few days back, state authorities announced.
In the attack on the border city’s state prison on Sunday at dawn, 20 people lost their lives while many others fled the facility. A gang leader Ernesto Alfredo Pinon, known as “El Neto,” and sentenced to more than 200 years in jail in 2010 for multiple crimes including kidnapping and murder was also among the 25 escapees.
The death of two agents from the state prosecutor’s office and five alleged criminals took the total fatalities to 26, as per a statement from the Chihuahua Public Security Department. Defense Minister Luis Cresencio Sandoval had earlier said that 10 guards, 7 prisoners and 2 attackers had died in Sunday’s attack on the prison. The armed attack was allegedly carried out by the drug traffickers. As many as 14 inmates and a guard were injured and five attackers were captured, said Sandoval further.
Ciudad Juarez sits across the border from El Paso, Texas, and has seen years of violent clashes between the security forces and rival drug cartels.
Mexico prisons
The prison itself has been a witness to multiple breakouts of fighting and riots. Twenty people had died in March 2009 in such an incident as Mexican detention centers suffer from chronic overcrowding and violence. — AFP/APP
