Mexican prison guards who ‘helped’ Zetas members kill rivals then escape are fired
Zetas medals on display.
Prison guards who apparently let inmates belonging to the brutal Los Zetas gang kill scores of rivals from the Gulf Cartel during a weekend riot then let others escape, have been fired along with the prison director.
Forty-four inmates of Monterrey's Apodaca prison — most of them from the Gulf Cartel — were killed in the Sunday riot, according to the BBC. Most were stabbed, strangled or beaten to death.
Gov. Rodrigo Medina of Nuevo Leon state said Monday that 30 inmates, some of them senior Zetas gangsters, had then escaped — probably using the riot as cover, the Miami Herald reported.
Medina reportedly said the unrest, in the prison, was the result of "treachery."
According to the BBC, he said that no firearms had been used and there was no sign of forced entry into the jail to free gang members.
The Associated Press quoted Medina as saying: "Unfortunately, a group of traitors has set back the work of a lot of good police. The most important thing is to make sure that the people working on the inside are on the side of the law, and that they not be corrupted and collaborate with the criminals, as the investigations indicate they presumably did."
He said 25 of the 30 who escaped were in the prison on federal charges, which the AP wrote often involved drug trafficking or illegal weapons possession.
A reward of 10 million pesos (almost $800,000) has been offered for information leading the arrest of those involved in the mass escape.
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