Guatemalan authorities have announced that a prison riot in the city of Puerto Barrios in the eastern state of Izabal has left eight inmates dead, with at least 24 seriously injured. The Puerto Barrios prison was constructed to house 175 prisoners, but there are currently over 900 inmates being held there, according to BBC News.
Overcrowding is an endemic problem in Guatemalan jails, where street gang members form the majority of the inmate population and gang warfare continues just as violently within prison walls as in the streets. The inmates are heavily armed with makeshift weaponry as well as smuggled firearms.
Thursday's outbreak of violence began after prison guards discovered a jailbreak plot, according to La Prensa. The rioting prisoners set mattresses and bed sheets on fire and managed to cut electrical power in the compound.
Two of the victims were decapitated and two others were burned to death, said Yesenia Enriquez, a spokeswoman for the prison system, reported The Washington Post. Authorities regained control of the situation, and several law enforcement agents remain inside the compound for inspection purposes.
Another large-scale prison fight broke out this past fall in Escuintla, a town south of the nation's capital of Guatemala City, where more than 3,000 prisoners are contained in a jail built for 600. Special forces and the army had to be called in to regain control of the situation, as BBC News reported at the time. Another escape attempt was also thwarted at Escuintla earlier this year when guards discovered a tunnel beneath the prison.
Guatemala's criminal organizations are primarily involved in drug and human trafficking, as well as abduction, extortion, money laundering, and other illegal operations, according to InSight Crime. These gangs are counted among the most sophisticated and violent in Central America, often being comprised of former militia, intelligence agencies and active police agents.
