In the aftermath of a massive escape from the overcrowded Bellavista prison in Ecuador following a deadly riot that left at least 44 dead, two hundred escaped inmates were "recaptured" by security forces on Tuesday, May 10.
They were found thanks to police and army patrols and checkpoints, said the chief of police operations, General Geovany Ponce.
A total of 220 prisoners escaped as a result of these clashes between two rival gangs in Bellavista prison, in the province of Santo Domingo de los Tsachilas.
The police had reported, Monday evening, 112 detainees "recaptured" and 108 others still in the wild.
The authorities are offering up to $3,000 in rewards to those who help capture the twenty or so prisoners still missing.
A "butcher's shop", according to the grieving relatives of the victims
On Tuesday, desperate and in tears, dozens of parents and relatives of prisoners were still waiting outside Bellavista prison awaiting news of their loved ones, AFP noted.
"They don't give us any information. They say that young men have escaped to save their lives, that others are going to be transferred," said Leisi Zambrano, without news from her brother.
"There are many mothers who, to this day, have not heard from their loved ones, who do not even know if they are alive," added the 48-year-old housewife.
As soon as she heard about the clashes, Leisi Zambrano explains that she ran to the prison in the early hours of the morning, with other family members.
"We heard the prisoners calling for help, that we don't let them die," she says, commenting: "It's a butcher's shop inside."
Horrifying videos are circulating on social media showing a pile of bloody, naked and mutilated bodies on the hemoglobin-covered floor of a common room.
Or corpses littering the corridors of the prison, next to mattresses that the attackers probably tried to set on fire.
An investigation and a reform demanded
According to Interior Minister Patricio Carrillo, members of the "Los Lobos" ("The Wolves") gang "attacked" members of the rival "R7" faction with knives.
In an attempt to stem the violence, six leaders of these gangs have since been transferred by helicopter from Bellavista to two high-security prisons elsewhere in the country.
“These disturbing incidents once again underline the urgent need for a comprehensive reform of the criminal justice system,” commented the spokesperson for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), for its part, condemned the violence and called for a "rapid, serious and impartial" investigation.
What happened in Bellavista prison "will be reflected in the neighborhoods (of the cities) where the gangs that clashed operate," human rights activist Luis Saavedra told AFP.
"The more violence there is in the prisons, the more murders there will be in these neighborhoods."
Clashes, often extremely violent, are recurrent in Ecuadorian prisons, where nearly 400 detainees have died since February 2021, including these latest clashes.
With AFP
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