Troops Storm Luxury Prison Run by Inmates

Amused

Elite Member
Apr 14, 2001
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Troops storm luxury prison run by inmates
POSTED: 7:09 a.m. EDT, September 26, 2006
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FRAIJANES, Guatemala (Reuters) -- Security forces took over a Guatemalan prison controlled for more than 10 years by inmates who produced drugs, lived in spacious homes with luxury goods and even rented space for stores and restaurants.

Seven prisoners died when 3,000 police and soldiers firing automatic weapons stormed the Pavon prison just after dawn Monday. Inmates, some carrying grenades, fired back.

"There was initial resistance by the inmates which was controlled in less than an hour," Interior Minister Carlos Vielmann told reporters.

Guards, often corrupt, only patrolled the prison's perimeter and ran the administration section while inmates organized crime empires on the outside from cell blocks and houses they built on the sprawling prison's large grounds.

A police pick-up truck drove out of Pavon after the raid carrying at least two bodies. A dead man's legs dangled out of the back of the vehicle.

Luis Alfonso Zepeda, a convicted murderer who headed an "order committee" elected by prisoners that controlled the prison for more than a decade, was killed in a shootout with security forces.

Zepeda earned around $25,000 a month from extortion and drug trafficking run from inside the prison, police said. His son Samuel lived illegally inside the prison to help run the crime empire, even though he was never sent there by a court.

Prisoners had set up laboratories to produce cocaine, crack and liquor inside Pavon, on the edge of the town of Fraijanes.

Homes on ground

Pavon was one of the worst prisons in Guatemala's penitentiary system, where common criminals, rival "mara" street gangsters and drug traffickers often battle for control.

"It's a center where organized crime, drug trafficking, kidnapping, extortion and all kinds of illicit activities were being controlled from," Vielmann said.

Inmates also built their own homes in the prison grounds. One belonging to a Colombian drug trafficker had a Jacuzzi, national prison director Alejandro Giammattei said.

The two-story wooden house boasted a king-sized bed and was protected by pedigree guard dogs, a witness said.

Giammattei asked prosecutors to investigate all of the 80 or so prison guards at Pavon for allowing drugs, weapons and hundreds of cell phones inside.

Pavon, southeast of the capital, was originally built for 800 inmates as a farm prison, where prisoners could grow their own food. But its population grew over time and inmates began to construct their own homes on the grounds.

The "order committee" sold new prisoners title deeds to homes in the grounds and rented space where inmates set up restaurants selling home cooking like stews and tortillas.

Stores controlled by the prisoners sold soft drinks and chips brought in from the outside.

After taking control, security forces began emptying Pavon of its 1,600 inhabitants and transferring them to another prison.

The operation came a day after Guatemala's main newspaper Prensa Libre published a long article about the prisoners' often relaxed lifestyle. Journalists who got into the prison said they bought marijuana, cocaine and crack there.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americas/...temala.prison.reut/index.html?eref=aol
 

Alienwho

Diamond Member
Apr 22, 2001
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Originally posted by: Dacalo
I wonder why the wealthier inmates stuck around instead of fleeing?

Why leave if you're making $25k a MONTH?

And realize, $25k a month is A LOT to you and me. But in Guatamala, that'd be like earning $100k a month.
 

frankgomez75

Platinum Member
Mar 23, 2004
2,215
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Originally posted by: Alienwho
Originally posted by: Dacalo
I wonder why the wealthier inmates stuck around instead of fleeing?

Why leave if you're making $25k a MONTH?

And realize, $25k a month is A LOT to you and me. But in Guatamala, that'd be like earning $100k a month.

:shocked: Where do I sign up? 25K a month!
 

DivideBYZero

Lifer
May 18, 2001
24,117
2
0
Originally posted by: frankgomez75
Originally posted by: Alienwho
Originally posted by: Dacalo
I wonder why the wealthier inmates stuck around instead of fleeing?

Why leave if you're making $25k a MONTH?

And realize, $25k a month is A LOT to you and me. But in Guatamala, that'd be like earning $100k a month.

:shocked: Where do I sign up? 25K a month!

The back streets of any run down American town.
 

BrokenVisage

Lifer
Jan 29, 2005
24,771
14
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Zepeda earned around $25,000 a month from extortion and drug trafficking run from inside the prison, police said. His son Samuel lived illegally inside the prison to help run the crime empire, even though he was never sent there by a court.

ROFL! So he "recruited" his son to help with the drug trade.. priceless.
 

pinion9

Banned
May 5, 2005
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Next time someone points out that our prison system caters to inmates, providing them with cable TV, weight facilities, and 3 square meals, point out to them that in Guatemala inmates have two-story homes, jacuzzis and restaurants.
 

AdamK47

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
15,747
3,585
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Why shut down a perfectly good prison when it does so much good for the local economy? Idiots!
 

acemcmac

Lifer
Mar 31, 2003
13,712
1
0
Originally posted by: pinion9
Next time someone points out that our prison system caters to inmates, providing them with cable TV, weight facilities, and 3 square meals, point out to them that in Guatemala inmates have two-story homes, jacuzzis and restaurants.

Yeah, why do american prisoners get cable tv, weight facilties and three suqare meals? I don't get any of that :thumbsdown:
 

b0mbrman

Lifer
Jun 1, 2001
29,470
1
81
Originally posted by: frankgomez75
Originally posted by: Alienwho
Originally posted by: Dacalo
I wonder why the wealthier inmates stuck around instead of fleeing?

Why leave if you're making $25k a MONTH?

And realize, $25k a month is A LOT to you and me. But in Guatamala, that'd be like earning $100k a month.

:shocked: Where do I sign up? 25K a month!

Read the fine print before you sign...there's sodomy involved
 

Amused

Elite Member
Apr 14, 2001
57,228
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Originally posted by: acemcmac
Originally posted by: pinion9
Next time someone points out that our prison system caters to inmates, providing them with cable TV, weight facilities, and 3 square meals, point out to them that in Guatemala inmates have two-story homes, jacuzzis and restaurants.

Yeah, why do american prisoners get cable tv, weight facilties and three suqare meals? I don't get any of that :thumbsdown:

Talk to a prison guard.

Without offering rewards and perks for good behavior, you end up with a situation like Attica. Those things are used to keep prisoners in line.
 

KillerCharlie

Diamond Member
Aug 21, 2005
3,691
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91
Originally posted by: acemcmac
Originally posted by: pinion9
Next time someone points out that our prison system caters to inmates, providing them with cable TV, weight facilities, and 3 square meals, point out to them that in Guatemala inmates have two-story homes, jacuzzis and restaurants.

Yeah, why do american prisoners get cable tv, weight facilties and three suqare meals? I don't get any of that :thumbsdown:


To keep them occupied so they don't start trouble. If you think it's so great, I'm sure they'd love to have you.
 

preslove

Lifer
Sep 10, 2003
16,754
64
91
Sh!t, that's nothing. Pablo Escobar had a prison MANSION, and he used escape routes built into the walls to escape when the columbians stormed it (he was probably tipped off, but still).

One good thing this says about Guatemala is that they could at least keep the plans for a raid quiet and not allow "prisoners" to escape before hand.
 

BooGiMaN

Diamond Member
Jul 5, 2001
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i saw a program on discover or one of those channels about a prison in colombia i think it was...basically the guards are outnumbered like 100 to one..and the turneover is very high...

so basically you are a guard getting paid minimum wage with no government support and the governement tells them to let the prisoners figure out how to get food and neccessities because they have no budget....and the prisoners have run the prison for a long time...the guards have no choice but to let the inmates run things to prevent all out violence.

the inmates have rules and their own justice system if other inmates step out of line.....its a very strict class system.